What She Carried
Her wedding flowers, painted on porcelain
The ask
Five of us were at college with the bride's mother, and we want to give one gift together. The wedding is next summer on the headland below the family house in Newfoundland, and the bride will carry what grows there, harebells and yarrow mostly. Something for their table. Around $150,000.
The gift
Eight place settings and a platter of Flora Danica from Royal Copenhagen, a service first made in 1790 and still painted by hand in Denmark. Each of the 25 pieces follows a plate in the Flora Danica, the botanical atlas of the Danish king's lands begun in 1761. We choose the motifs from the plants of her bouquet and her headland that the atlas holds, and each is named in Latin underneath.
Why it's extraordinary
For Princess Alexandra's wedding in 1863, a committee of Danish women chose the same service as their gift to her. Her mother's oldest friends now give it together, painted with the flowers she carries for a single day.
The moment
At the first dinner in their own house, the harebell plate goes to her place, and the bouquet comes back to the table each time it is set.
A curator replies within one business day.
