How To Extend The Life Of Your Fresh Bouquet

Remove any dead or wilted flowers.

After receiving your floral arrangement, you should first remove the packaging, cellophane, and paper. The next step to extending your bouquet's life is to remove any dead or wilted flowers. You can do this by hand, or you can use sharp scissors to cut them off. If you're using a vase with a wide opening, removing the dead flowers by hand is easiest.

With sharp clippers, trim at least an inch off of each flower stem.

A sharp pair of scissors or clippers will do the trick. Cut each flower stem at an angle, just below the flower. This is important for two reasons: it keeps your bouquet looking fresh and prevents wilting. Cutting your stems too close to the base of the flower can cause it to fall over—which isn't very aesthetically pleasing!

When you cut them, make sure you leave at least an inch from where you stem meets its leafy base. This helps ensure that they don't grow too long while they are sitting in a vase by themselves (which would cause them to bend). If your buds have already started growing outwards, trimming off another inch might be necessary—just remember not to go overboard!

Place your flowers in a clean vase with fresh water.

To extend your fresh bouquet's life, it is recommended placing your flowers in a clean vase with fresh water. Choose a vase that is 1-2 inches bigger than your flowers—you want to make sure that there's lots of room for them to expand as they drink up their new home!

Make sure the base of the vase has some weight and heft—this will help it stay put when you move around. Lastly, don't go overboard on the size of your vessel! Some people may want something larger than themselves (and then again...), but if this is too much too soon, it could result in an awkward situation where no one knows what else needs doing and everyone just stands around awkwardly looking at each other.

Add your special mix of sugar and bleach (not household bleach).

Now that you have your flowers, it's time for the next step: mixing up a solution that will help keep your bouquet looking fresh.

Sugar and bleach are two ingredients you'll need to make this work. The first is pretty self-explanatory—you're adding sugar to water, which will help your flowers stay hydrated. But why add bleach? This is where things get a little more complicated, but stick with me here! Bleach helps kill bacteria that could otherwise spoil the blossoms over time. It's also important to note that household bleach won't do; instead, use a ratio of 1/2 teaspoon per every 1 cup of water (or 50 millilitres).

Change the water every 2-3 days.

One of the biggest mistakes you can make when storing or displaying an arrangement is not changing the water. The reason for this is simple: flowers are like humans and require oxygen to stay healthy. The more often you change the water, the more likely you are to keep your flowers fresh longer. You should change the water every day if possible, but at a minimum of every 2-3 days.

Keep your arrangements away from direct sunlight, heat, or cold drafts.

In order to extend the life of your arrangement, you should always keep it away from direct sunlight, heat, and cold drafts. Sunlight can cause flowers to wilt and fade faster than they would otherwise. Heat will make them dry up and die more quickly. Cold drafts will cause their stems to break more easily. You should also keep flower arrangements out of windows so that they don't catch colds or get bored with nothing on the other side of them but a brick wall all day long (which, let's face it, is pretty dull).

Also avoid placing them near doors because people tend to walk through doorways without looking where they are going very often; if one runs into your bouquet while holding flowers in each hand, it could be devastating for both parties involved!