I strongly recommend working with Growing Wild. We went out to the farm to pick out the flowers that we liked using little flower playing cards, which was extremely fun. The flowers were stunning. One of my bridesmaids said that she's been a bridesmaid several times but had never had such a gorgeous bouquet because usually the bridesmaid bouquet is really small and sad looking. All the bouquets were stunning. The chuppah was vibrant. Growing Wild also really listens to their clients and helps come up with really good solutions, like our flower girl passing out flowers to guests rather than dropping petals. I strongly recommend that you give your flower girl a flower halo because then the bride gets to wear it later that night which is just so beautiful. Growing Wild was one of the first vendors were booked, and I have no regrets at all about this choice. read more

Working with Growing Wild was such an amazing and special experience for us from the start. They were recommended to us from our venue and I'm so glad we found them. First of all, working with Barbara in itself was one of our favorite parts- she lends such a great, quirky, humorous, but warm energy to the experience that made us feel at ease and taken care of. She encouraged coming out to her farm whenever we could to see the flowers, containers, and candles, and to discuss all of the nitty gritty details. Growing Wild is unique in that they grow and supplement with their own flowers on Barbara's amazing northern VA farm property in addition to wholesale purchased florals. She has much more flex and creativity in what flowers can be used on your day. So, what does this mean? This means that on our LATE JUNE wedding, we got luxurious and highly coveted peonies and ranunculus from the farm!!! These normally are ephemeral May only flowers. It's clear that Barbara and her team have such an expert understanding of blending colors, textures, and moods (yes, flowers have moods!) that if you just give her your color palette, wedding vibe, and budget, she can comfortably take it from there. I had a vision from the start and she understood completely what I wanted and how to deliver with great tips and tricks to tie in other elements I hadn't even considered. If I brought in ideas, Barbara found a way to make it happen. Now, let's talk about budgeting. Growing Wild was so understanding and respectful of having a clear budget and staying close to or within it. Barbara was straightforward about what would cost more, how to stay within budget, what was worth it and what wasn't, and was so reasonable with pricing and worked so well with us in our pricing comfort zone. She knows all the tricks to getting the best bang for your buck, including lots of floral repurposing. On my wedding day, I was absolutely blown away by the florals and there is no question the tone, beauty, and visual experience they set for everyone on the day. The colors, the artful arrangements, the creativity, the variety....wow!!! They even repurposed the flowers on our arch to below our sweetheart table which created an amazing look. Many arrangements had multiple purposes and gave me such joy to see used more than once- the bridesmaids bouquets in clear vases near the welcome area, the ceremony chair posies used on tables at cocktail hour and on the outside steps at our reception, and the two large aisle arrangements creatively flanking our greenery/neon sign wall (which I didn't think of and never would have, and was so excited to see when I walked in- genius for awesome photos). Barbara's daughter Lindsey did most of the floral coordination and set up on the day of and she was similarly just as awesome and artful with the entire experience. Barbara and the Growing Wild team, you all made our floral dreams come true and we can't imagine our day without you in it. I'll never forget all of our flowers; from my bouquet, to the ceremony arch, to the high and low arrangements, to the whimsical welcome sign arrangement... the list goes on and on. We got SO many compliments. HIRE GROWING WILD! read more

Growing wild provided all the flowers for our wedding and they were beautiful. Their floral services really made the day so much more special. We highly recommend them. read more

At the end of the night I told my new husband "I don't want to take off my crown, then I won't be a princess anymore". I LOVED my bouquet and my crown (and my center pieces!) but my bouquet and my crown, once I had those two accessories, I became the bride I had always wanted to be. EVERYONE kept telling me "your pictures are great! You had a Pinterest perfect wedding!" And I did! I had my mom plan my wedding, I live in Cali and am in school, and I sent my mom photos, my mom took those Pinterest photos to Barbra, and I got EXACTLY what I wanted. My favorite part of my wedding was my flower crown and bouquet. They were so fresh and stayed fresh all day. My bouquet was SO FULL and dense and just, I just can't get over the flowers! If you need flowers get your flowers here. read more

Barbara is truly a class act and is, unsurprisingly, phenomenal at her job. She was responsive, creative, easy to work with, affordable, prompt, and everything else you could ever want. At times it was like she could read our mind in knowing what it was that we wanted! Truly cannot recommend her enough to anyone in the D.C. or Northern Virginia area. Growing Wild is as good as they come! read more

Barbara did my wedding flowers back in 2005 and I still can't get over how amazing they were all these years later. I'm throwing a milestone birthday party next year and am beyond excited to be able to use her again. I can't wait! She's the best there is and I'm so happy to see she's still in business! read more

Where do I begin?? We met with Barbara, blindly from a recommendation. She completely understood and embraced our vision for my daughters recent D.C. wedding. We gave her a budget and she totally exceeded our expectations and went above and beyond to make the day exactly what we had envisioned. I might add that as the Mother of the bride, I am a florist myself so I was probably Barbara's worst nightmare. Helping with the wedding from long distance and wanting to enjoy the day without a worry was of utmost concern. Barbara alleviated all of those concerns and handled all of the details to the letter! We cannot begin to express what a wonderful job she did. If you are looking for someone to do flowers for your event, PLEASE give Barbara a call! Thank you Barbara and the Growing Wild staff! read more

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Growing Wild did a fantastic job for my wedding. I loved their work and appreciated how well they took my comments and brought them to life. Thank you! read more

Barbara at Growing Wild is amazing! She created the most beautiful flower arrangements for my wedding ceremony and reception and was great to work with throughout the whole planning process. My husband and I didn't know much about flowers going in the wedding planning process and ended up meeting with Barbara based on a recommendation from a co-worker. She asked us for our budget and then we spent about an hour talking about colors and flower types. She never tried to upsell us on anything and was constantly looking ways to do more with a tighter budget. For example, my husband and I were very flexible on flower type for the arrangements so this allowed her to cut costs a lot because she could fill in the arrangements with different flowers that she was growing on her farm. Since we didn't know much about flowers, Barbara made it super easy by going through a ton of pictures with us from both Pinterest and other weddings she has done and having us say whether we liked it or not. By the end of that first meeting, she helped us to decide on exactly what we wanted (even though we went into it just knowing that we wanted pretty and colorful flowers). On the day of the wedding all the flowers arrived on time and looked absolutely beautiful. We received so many comments from our guests on how beautiful all the arrangements were. Barbara was so thoughtful with every little detail - she even thought to provide extra vases so that the bridesmaids bouquets could be used as extra decoration at the reception. I would highly recommend working with Barbara! She made the whole process affordable, easy, and everything turned out even better than I had imagined! read more

We were fortunate to have a friend refer us to Barbara at Growing Wild. As someone who loves flowers, but with little background knowledge, she did an excellent job of making my wife feel comfortable. She left the first meeting with her completely at-ease and even more excited about the wedding. We knew flowers could be a big ticket item, but really appreciated Barbara's willingness to not only work with our budget but also point out ways to stretch our dollar further instead of trying to get us to opt for more expensive/unnecessary options. We were completely satisfied with the results and love that most of the flowers came straight from their Virginia garden. read more

Barbara came recommended by a friend and she was fantastic! I've never met anyone as passionate and excited about what they do as Barbara. She knows every single flower and when they are in bloom and has amazing ideas based on seasonal availability. We described what sort of look we wanted and Barbara used her vision to create stunning arrangements. Every flower was huge and gorgeous and nearly half of our guests commented on how beautiful they were. Aside from the quality, Barbara's prices are amazing. She grows her own flowers on her farm (which we were invited to see - it was great!), helping with the affordability. I would 100% use Barbara for my next event and I've already recommended her to several people. (Will update with pictures once we get them back). read more

Barbara is amazing. Hands down. She came highly recommended from our caterer and did not disappoint! Before signing with her my fiance and I went to visit her in Delaplane and talked a lot about our vision for the day - elegant, black tie, evening, fall colors without being kitchy (like orange and yellow-blah). However fancy our wedding was, I couldn't justify spending a fortune on flowers so she worked within my low budget. We looked at a lot of pictures on her computer and she told us about the flowers she could use from her amazing garden. My fiance loves orchids and I was really nervous they would be super expensive but she used them in the boutonnieres and as accent flowers for the cakes and they looked great without the outrageous price. We didn't talk all year until about a week before the ceremony where we reviewed the order in detail - I wanted white for the ceremony/personal flowers and a mix of red and pink for the reception (which is a hard color combo to mix) but she nailed it! I was very bad at articulating what I did like but i was very good at telling her what I DIDN'T like and luckily she was able to customize something perfect for me based on that. She spends lots of time with you on making sure she understands exactly what you want. I also had flowers delivered to 2 separate locations (church and reception) and she didn't cost extra for delivery. Use her! read more

Barbara Von Elm at Growing Wild Floral is THE BEST. My daughter's wedding was 4/25/15 at The Airlie in Warrenton. All of the arrangements were fabulous. The bridal bouquet was exquisite and took our breath away and the bridesmaid bouquets were too! My bride didn't want to put her bouquet down because she loved it that much! She continued to carry it around on Sunday as well - it just made her smile so much:) The bridesmaids wore the Jenny Yoo "Annabelle" dress in Cameo pink and Barbara did a combination of light pinks and light corals and white. The boutonnieres were great; we wanted a perfect size, not too big for the guys. The 2 altar arrangements were fabulous and out-of-this-word gorgeous - there are no words to describe how beautiful they were. We also had a few mason jars hanging from the chair backs, which we moved to the cocktail tables after the ceremony. The reception table arrangements were done in 6" square glass vases and made the tables so pretty. Barbara is a dream to work with! She knows her stuff and you can trust and believe in her ability and vision to provide you with a beautiful and memorable wedding and gorgeous pictures for years to come! read more