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We've chosen several arrangements from our favorite florists around the web; many of them are bridal bouquets, but the concepts can easily be applied to flower arrangements for your home.

Our Favorite Varieties:

Dahlias and tulips both come in "black," though they are not so much true black as a kind of deep purple or maroon. There is a super-fragrant variety of sweet pea in this color as well. The scruffy cornflower, great for a rustic, wild-looking bouquet, can also be found in "black." Honeywort, an unusual bell-shaped bloom, comes in a dark midnight blue.

Of course there is the lovely, fleeting chocolate cosmo, a dark brown bloom that only lasts a few days when cut, but has a sweet fragrance (more like vanilla, really, than chocolate). Fiddlehead ferns, while not a flower per se, are one of our favorite additions to a bouquet, with their graphic spiral shape and rich purplish brown.

A Few Tips:

Punctuate pale arrangements with dark flowers to add a note of chic contrast to your spring and summer bouquets. The deep maroon tones of most of these flowers look beautiful against white, lime-green or dusty rose. To avoid a polka-dotted look, incorporate your dark accents in an asymmetrical pattern, and try using two or three different-shaped dark blooms for texture. Choosing odd numbers of flowers is always a good rule of thumb for arranging bouquets, and it's especially helpful when working in dark blooms.

For a dramatic statement, of course, you can always do an entire bouquet of dark flowers (like the calla lilies and cosmos from Soulflower above).

Here's a key to the photos so you can go looking for more inspiration:

• 1 and 2 - Cool Oak Lane
• 3 - Saipua
• 4 and 5 - Ink and Peat
• 6 and 7 - Soulflower
• 8 - Apartment 46

And some past inspiration from Apartment Therapy... For more black tulip love, see this post; an homage to black dahlias here; and if you're interested in planting black flowers in your garden, this post has some helpful tips.

What are your favorite "black" flowers?