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About Daniel
The Story
The Flowers Came First
Daniel Marcey grew up watching his father run a florist. Through middle school and high school, he’d skip class during the big holidays (Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, Christmas) to work alongside him. No textbook taught him what those years did. By the time he was in his late teens, he picked up some flowers one afternoon and simply started designing. It came naturally. It always had. The floral industry has a history measured in centuries, but for Daniel, it has always been personal.
When the family florist was eventually sold, Daniel knew he wasn’t done with flowers. He just wasn’t sure what came next. Then one evening, watching television, he saw a woman talking about something he’d never heard of: freeze-dried flowers. He asked his father. His father hadn’t heard of it either.
He started researching. He found a company in Arizona called Botanique that manufactured freeze-dry machines for the floral preservation industry. He reached out. They sent samples
He remembers sitting next to his father when the box arrived. He opened it and looked at what was inside. The roses looked fresh.
That Was the Moment
He wrote a business plan, secured a $50,000 SBA loan, bought the largest machine he could afford, and opened his first studio at a storefront in Old Town Alexandria, VA. That storefront became the foundation of what is now Queen & I - Floral Preservation, established in Reston, VA.
Daniel’s family has been in the floral business for 75 years. He is a ninth-generation Washingtonian and the second generation to make flowers his life’s work. He has two young children, and he looks forward to bringing them into the studio one day, the same way his father once brought him, hoping the work catches one of them the way it caught him, and a third generation is born into the flower business.
A Deliberate Choice
Queen & I serves Washington DC metro brides exclusively. That is not a limitation. It is the whole point.
When Daniel first started, he accepted bouquets from all over the country. Brides would ship their flowers to him, he would do the work, and he would ship everything back. It was scalable. It was also wrong.
Flowers shipped from out of state arrived without the same connection. He hadn’t seen them at the wedding, and there was no design consultation where he could sit across from the couple, hear how they met, and learn the story behind their day. That conversation is where the connection actually happens. It’s how a bouquet stops being loose flowers tied together and starts being somebody’s wedding. Skip it, and something is missing before the work even begins. And once the finished piece left his hands, the return journey was outside his control: flowers coming loose in transit, arrangements shifting from vibration, problems that required fixes he couldn’t personally oversee.
He stopped.
The decision was also practical. Approximately 38,000 couples marry in the Washington DC metro area every year. The market Daniel knew best (the one he had served for decades, the one where he is a ninth-generation native) was already one of the most active wedding markets in the country. There was no reason to look elsewhere.
And then there was the question of how he wanted to work.
Mail-order preservation operations process 10 to 30 bouquets a week, moving flowers through a team in stages. Daniel works with 2 to 3 brides per week, by design. Every bouquet that comes into his Reston, VA studio is handled by him personally, from pickup through the final design consultation to delivery. That is not a business model built for volume. It is a business model built for work he is proud of. Quality over quantity. It has always been that simple.
Brides who book with Queen & I are not one of dozens. They are one of a few, and that is exactly the point.
The Moment That
Makes It Worth It
There is a moment Daniel has never gotten used to, and does not want to.
It happens when a bride comes to pick up her finished piece and sees it for the first time. Whatever he expected her reaction to be, it is always more than that. The work stops her. She goes quiet, or she doesn’t. Either way, something moves through her that takes her directly back to her wedding day: the flowers, the room, the person standing across from her.
In his own words:
“Truly the best part of what I do comes when a client is picking up their finished work and seeing it for the first time. Watching what I have done evoke such emotion and taking them back to what they felt on their wedding day. There is no other feeling like it.”
“Working with a wedding bouquet both connects me emotionally to my past and connects my clients to their wedding date for a lifetime.”
That is what this work is. Not a product. Not a transaction. A thread between then and now, made permanent.
If you’re ready to see which of the four Wedding Service formats fits your flowers (Shadowbox, Pressed Flowers, Resin, or Bas-Relief), that page walks through each one in detail.
Ready to Talk About
Your Flowers?
Daniel works with just 2–3 DC metro brides each week, by design: every bouquet gets his full attention, from pickup through the final piece. That means availability fills earlier than most brides expect, whether your wedding is still months away or has already happened. A phone call is the easiest way to start: Daniel will answer your questions honestly, walk you through what’s possible for your flowers, and help you figure out the right next step: no pressure, no obligation. If you’d rather see finished work in person first, studio visits in Reston, VA are available by appointment.
Queen & I - Floral Preservation
11328 Dockside Circle, Reston, VA 20191
Monday – Sunday, 10AM – 7PM
Phone: 703-989-4682
Email: Dan@Queenandi.com