How do you make sure that your wedding is environmentally friendly? You may be searching for some sustainable wedding ideas you can use for your big day, and we want to share with you some of the best eco-friendly options that people are incorporating into their weddings this year, from place settings to dresses and everything in between.
Pick a Convenient Venue
Cutting down on fossil fuel usage is a great way to have a positive impact on the environment. When you choose your wedding, you may want to hold off on the destination wedding and instead pick something that’s convenient for friends and family members to attend.
Pick a venue that’s close to them so that they don’t have to travel a lot, wasting valuable fuel, spending a lot of money, and buying plane tickets to get to your wedding. Y
our guests will appreciate how thoughtful you are with your venue choice, and you’ll be more likely to have the guests you want attending as well. You will also be making a drastic environmental impact compared to placing your wedding somewhere exotic. Save the exotic locales for your honeymoon if you’re looking to have a sustainable wedding.
Environmentally Conscious Stationery
You may also want to think about the paper products that are being used in the wedding. Many of these might be considered disposable and just tossed away after the wedding is finished. That’s a huge waste of resources, and a more sustainable option would be to buy reusable napkins and other stationery. Or, you can scale down the stationery usage considerably.
Instead of sending out paper wedding invitations, why not send them digitally? You can create more ornate designs, make the invitation longer, and get immediate replies. Plus, you’ll be positively impacting the environment.
Instead of using a number of different stationary pieces on your table settings, consider using just one that makes a bold statement.
Sustainable wedding should be about making an impact on your guests and creating a memorable event while reducing your environmental impact. So, consolidate your ideas into single statement pieces as much as possible rather than spreading out ideas across multiple items that will end up in the trash later on.
For any stationery that you’re going to use for the wedding, from invitations to place settings, be sure to use recycled paper. Ask your stationery supplier where the paper is from and specially request recycled items to preserve the environment.
Use Local, Seasonal Flowers
While many brides will have particular flowers in mind for their bouquets, decorations, and other floral wedding needs, with a sustainable wedding, you’ll want to limit the flowers you use. Ask your florist about what flowers will be in season on the date of the wedding.
Use locally sourced flowers to reduce the use of resources, and try to limit how many flower shops you have to visit and how many sources the flowers have to come from to make their way to your wedding.
Use Reusable Décor
A lot of the decor you use for your wedding venue and reception venue can be taken from reusable sources. There may be friends and family members who have decor in their home that you can use in your wedding. Instead of shopping at stores for your decor or having the items custom made for the wedding, you can try shopping at your friend’s houses, if they will allow it.
You may not be able to get all of the decor you need from a couple of sources, so you can send out your wedding theme and decoration requests with the wedding invitations. Or you can send out separate decor requests to people you know might have some of the items you need. Even if you don’t get all the decorations you require this way, you can save yourself a lot of money and have a much more sustainable wedding.
Another way you can be sustainable with the wedding decor is to have a holiday themed wedding and use leftover holiday decorations to spruce up the venue.
Give Back with Your Wedding
When you’re trying to be sustainable and environmentally friendly with your wedding, think about how your wedding will impact and benefit other people and the rest of the world and not just how it benefits you. Your wedding is a great opportunity to share the love with others, and you can ask your guests to donate to charitable causes and environmental groups rather than to give you a personal gift.
If you’re going in this direction with your wedding, be sure to highlight these charitable gifts on the wedding day so that people can see the kind of impact they’ve had and appreciate just how much was given to these good causes.
Use Sustainable Diamonds
Be very careful about the diamonds you use in your wedding, if you’re going to have any. One way to avoid this problem entirely is to simply reuse diamonds from previous weddings of friends and family members. Using heirloom rings and jewelry is a great way to keep the jewelry in the family, save money, and be eco-friendly with your choices.
Have an Outdoor Wedding
If you’re wanting to cut down on greenhouse gases and emissions for your wedding, then take it outdoors rather than an indoor venue. You’ll save on electricity, gas, and other resources that use perishable elements or fossil fuels.
An outdoor wedding can be eco-friendly in a lot of ways, as it highlights your love of the environment and can help foster a love and others. It reduces the number of resources necessary to make your wedding happen, saves you money, and offers a great opportunity to use natural, sustainable elements that look great in the outdoor setting.
If you’re trying to go green for your wedding, we hope these ideas inspire you. Even if you can only put a few of them to use, you’ll be making an impact and a difference, and you will be setting a great example for others who may not be quite so sure how to foster sustainability for their weddings.