Inspiration for your road to the altar

I wanted our rehearsal dinner invitations to be fun and casual since we’re planning a relaxed dinner in the harbor of the resort we’ll be staying in. And since I sacrificed my love for the nautical theme in favor of black, white and green, I gave myself permission to use it for this! I was looking for nautical inspiration without using boats and anchors, and came across this bouquet and boutonniere on brides.
I loved the stripes with the green mixed in, so this is what I came up with (I just changed the pertinent info instead of blurring things out):
It’s a little hard to tell, but the stripes are a really dark blue. I am hoping it achieves the “nautical with out the cheesy” look I was going for!

In my quest for something “different,” I thought about the possibility of using succulents in the wedding for quite awhile at the beginning of the planning process. I landed on hydrangeas instead, but I still love the way succulents look. The colors in the plant above are so soft and pretty, and the texture of the succulents is so fantastic. I could even see these clustered as centerpieces (images from The Martha Blog):
Then this morning I came across a wedding shot by Julie Mikos…I’ve seen succulents used in bouquets before but never quite like this! It’s so unique & I really love the boutonniere. B is really against using anything “girly” for the boutonnieres, or anything that even remotely resembles a berry. I think we might be able to get away with that one. My bouquet is already planned out, but the bouts are another story! Would it be weird to only use succulents in the bouts?

We’re going up to Wisconsin to meet with a florist and a lighting designer this weekend, so I’ve been trying to gather as many pictures as possible before then. Turns out, I don’t really like boutonnieres. I don’t really like them at all. The majority of them just seem really awkward and cheesy to me, but somehow I feel like they’re needed. Brad doesn’t really like them much either, so after a lot of searching I found 5 pictures that I can live with & actually kind of like the more I look at them. The top & bottom pictures on the left side are my favorites, but I also like the ranunculus if they were white. Anyone have any thoughts? And does anyone know what those crazy curlycue things are? I love those!