When someone we love passes away, words often fail us. In those moments, flowers become the language of love, remembrance, and farewell. They are the last gift we can give—a final gesture of beauty, thanks and care. But while traditional arrangements are always thoughtful, adding personal touches can make funeral flowers feel even more meaningful.
Here are some gentle ways to make the last flowers your loved one receives truly personal.
1. Choose Their Favourite Flowers/ loves or Colours
Did they adore love their garden? Smile roses in the summertime? Did they love woodland walks, trees, the countryside, wild flower meadows or maybe they had a favourite colour that always brightened their day Or a colour they always wore. Choosing flowers and colours that reflect their personal taste is a beautiful way to honour who they were. Even the simplest bouquet becomes powerful when it carries their essence
2. Reflect Their Personality and Passions
Flowers can tell a story.
- For a vibrant, fun-loving spirit, a bright mix of wildflowers feels joyful and thankful for a life lived with joy and passion.
- For someone who loved the outdoors, arrangements with foliage, moss, different tree branches such as willow or oak or seasonal branches bring nature into the tribute.
- For a keen gardener, including flowers or foliage from their own garden is something we like to do, how lovely their last flowers were grown by them, a tender nod to the life they nurtured. We love to visit people’s gardens and pick from them for their farewell flowers.
- If they were farming you can include crops, they have grown such as wheat or Barley, we have even added teasels with a snag of sheep’s wool on for a much-loved sheep farmer.
3. Add Meaning Through Symbolism
Throughout history, flowers have carried messages:
- Lilies represent peace and purity.
- Forget-me-nots symbolize remembrance.
- Yellow roses for friendship
- Rosemary has long been tied to memory.
One thing i do encourage my families to use flowers that loved one adored but if they were not a flowery person and not everyone is, is it use seasonal flowers, these can be in your chosen colour palette but I feel it a nice to represent the time of year when they have passed as a nod to the circle of life and the seasons of the years, they have lived
Blending these symbolic choices with personal favourites adds another layer of depth—words woven in petals.
4. Include Personal Touches
Sometimes the smallest details mean the most. A ribbon in their favourite colour, a handwritten note tied into the stems, or even a small keepsake tucked into the arrangement—a farmers cap they wore every day, a wooden spoon for a baker, items found on a countryside ramble such as cones, twigs, branches they had picked up along the way can make the flowers feel uniquely theirs.
5. Styles that suit
The style of the arrangement can also reflect the person and the service:
- A large, traditional spray can look stunning on a wooden or willow casket for a burial or cremation.
Gentle, hand-tied sheath is a lovely tribute that can be kept after and enjoyed in a vase.
Natural burial grounds suit a hand tied sheath of seasonal or wild flowers with a garland of foliage around the willow coffin
Some families like to do a really special personal tribute such as a Hereford Bull, Biker Helmet, Owl, Dart Board, Shamrock, Butterly, Duck or fairy garden Fairy Garden
But for me it will always be seasonal flowers, like daffodils, tulips in spring or evergreens and berries in winter, to connect the tribute with the rhythms of nature.
What happens to the flowers after? Is a question I get asked a lot.
Burial: these flowers are placed on the grave until they have gone over.
Cremation: These flowers should always be collected by your Funeral director or by the family, many take them on to a wake or church service. I do make my flowers so they can be bunched up afterward and given to friends and family or placed on another loved one’s grave.
Natural Burial Grounds: these flowers have to be made and designed with certain rules adhered to; no plastic, no foam, no wire, ribbon or anything that is not bio-degradable everything has be too able to return to nature.
If you don’t have somewhere to take your flowers and you do not want to keep them a lovely idea is to bunch them up and take them to your local Hospice, for people who are in the last months of life to enjoy, for loved ones saying goodbye to find peace and comfort from flowers around them
A Final Thought
Funeral flowers are so much more than decoration. They are a tribute, a message, and a memory all in one. By choosing blooms that reflect your loved one’s life, you give them not just the last flowers they will ever receive—but a final gift filled with love, meaning, and remembrance.
Recommendations:
Funeral Directors:
Natural Burial Grounds:
Humber Woodland of Remembrance;
Green Burials @ Offa’s Orchard.
Casket Makers: Bespoke Willow Coffins Handmade in Herefordshire.
