Chinatown Chic

As you might remember from my last post, our floral design for the personal bouquets and the reception decor consisted of lush, romantic, fresh-from-the-garden-like arrangements of big blooms.    But I also wanted to bring in some eastern elements as a nod to my Chinese heritage and save some cash by cutting down the number of fresh flowers needed, because, let's face it, saving money is the ultimate nod to my Chinese heritage.

One day I was scanning celebrity wedding planner Michelle Rago's blog and found the perfect way of doing Chinatown chic on the cheap.  Behold the gorgeousness she assembled for a Chinoiserie-themed wedding:

[Michelle Rago]

Brilliant!  A bamboo bird cage enclosing a few blooms.  I'm planning on sourcing a few of these from China when I'm there later this month, but one could just as easily get them from Pearl River Mart or from Chinatown on the relatively cheap.

And here's another vignette from Michelle Rago:

She did this with what looks to be fancy gourd-shaped vases, but I'm thinking a few loose blooms in bamboo steamers would look just as chic.  Pearl River has these steamers for less than $5, and I'm willing to bet that local Chinese restaurant supply stores or Chinese grocery stores would have them for even cheaper.

I'm going to keep these Asian decorative elements to just the cocktail area, so I'm only going to need maybe two bird cages and five bamboo steamers.  I want to allude to Chinese culture, not make it a themed wedding, so I have to force myself to, in the immortal words of Tim Gunn, "edit, edit, edit."  If I get overly exuberant, the area will go from Chinese chic to Chinese restaurant reject in less time than it'll take me to say "me rove you rong time."

How are you integrating your culture into your wedding?  Any other ideas about how to keep a floral budget within reasonable bounds?