Green Wedding Odd's & Ends

As I wrap up this series on greening your wedding plans I find myself with a couple final suggestions that could make a significant contribution to your efforts to use less resources while maintaining a beautifully memorable wedding celebration.

• Something Borrowed, Something Blue…: Well something borrowed anyway… Borrowing Grandma’s, Mom’s, or big Sis’ wedding dress makes a lot of sense, both for your budget and world wide resources – especially since you only wear the dress one time.
• Hire a string quartet or singer and accompanist to provide music: Yes, I have touched on this one before, but I believe this bears consideration. After all, little will do more to add a touch of class and elegance to a wedding reception than a live sting quartet or swing band (acoustic) besides, a disc jockey and all his equipment uses a lot of electricity. A string quartet or a singer with a piano player (acoustic) requires no more electricity than enough light to allow them to see their music – if they even need sheet music.
• Go paperless: Create a wedding website and use electronic invitations. This can save you money as well as limiting the natural resources you use - both on the invitations and on the postage! Besides, it is a great way to get your groom-to-be to take over significant parts of your wedding preparations!

Really, just like every other part of wedding planning, the act of planning a green wedding can be beneficial - and not only because it will respect the world's resources more, but because it forces each bride to reconsider each element of the wedding day and decide what is most important to her. That is what will make a memorable day.

Greening Your Wedding: Think Light

Daylight, that is. God supplies us plenty of lighting through the sun - especially during the traditional wedding seasons of the spring and fall. Make use of it.

• Plan a garden wedding
• Plan a beach wedding
• Get married by the lake or river
• Rent a hall during daylight hours with ample windows so that a minimum of lights are required

Finding a location or facility that works in this way is not as hard as it may seem. I know a church whose north facing back wall of the sanctuary is mostly glass, looking out onto their own private garden. This facility rarely needs general lighting during daylight hours.

Of course, there is nothing like an outdoor wedding for beauty and unless the wedding or reception is held in the evening, there is no need for lights. Instead, time your ceremony so that the two of you are literally riding off 'into the sunset' on your departure. It is a picture perfect way to complete the public celebration of your wedding and begin your private celebration.

Greening Your Wedding: Think Local

Another way to naturally green your wedding is to think local. Here are a couple ways to do so:

• Choose a facility in the neighborhood where you and your loved ones live so most, if not all of the participants can walk. This will save gas and congestion issues. In urban communities like the boroughs of New York, and in small towns across America where families tend to live close to one another, it makes a lot of sense to find a local spot where a beautiful wedding and reception can be put together without requiring everyone one involved to travel across town.
• Invite only local guests: In our mobile society this might not be practical. However, less travel means a smaller carbon footprint.
• Commit to choosing neighborhood wedding professionals and resources such as flowers and produce where possible. This will save gas and congestion in your community, build relationships within your community, and will help your local economy.

For those of us who grew up in a mobile society, the idea of limiting our celebration to the local community seems extreme. But a wedding that celebrates the contributions and distinctives of its local community could be a truly memorable event!

Think Intimate

Those who want to reduce the carbon footprint of their wedding should think in terms of an intimate wedding celebration. Is it really necessary to throw a bigger party than that bride did last year? Instead show how much you care by thinking small - and local. It will save you money and resources. Besides think how much more you could do if you don't need to pay to feed (and in some cases, house) a ton of out of town guests.

• Perhaps you could rent a string quartet or a swing band (brass, reeds, etc)
• Save money and gas by personally delivering the invitations via bicycle or horse drawn carriage
• Build a gazebo in a family member's yard for the wedding and years of memories
• Create a wedding garden that you can enjoy for years to come
• Come up with a creative way to arrive at the wedding - can you say, rickshaw?

Have fun. An intimate wedding can be every bit as memorable as a big wedding and perhaps more. At the same time, the potential is there to cut down on the use of resources, traffic congestion, and the money you have to spend all at the same time.

Greening Your Wedding

One word: Plants

There is nothing greener than... well, greenery - live that is. It's beautiful and healthy for the environment. Here are a couple ideas to incorporate plants into your wedding celebration:

Buy live (potted) plants as centerpieces and accent pieces and then arrange for them to be planted afterwards: Have guests take the live centerpieces home. Give the larger accent plants to members of the wedding party who have room to plant them in their yard or maintain the potted plant in their home.

Have a planting ceremony: If you are getting married at a location where you can get permission, say Uncle Joe’s mini ranch that has an unused portion of the property or a long driveway, purchase saplings and have all each of your guests plant one after the new couple plants a special tree to symbolize the strength and vitality of the new relationship. It will beautify the property and after a few years maybe Uncle Joe will have a family Christmas Tree Farm!

Give seed wedding favors: Even if the situation does not allow for live plants in the wedding celebration, seed wedding favors are a great way to help to green the wedding. There are a number of options available but they range from specially shaped papers with seeds embedded that the guests simply covers with soil and waters for a floral burst, to seed packets.

Happy greening!

2007 Wedding Trend

Some wedding trends are obvious. Like the big hair of the nineteen eighties. Like the trend away from all white wedding cakes to cakes full of color. Or this year's trend toward accessorizing the cake with cake jewelry. Like personalizing a wedding cake iced in white fondant by having it delivered a day early (this will cost you in freshness) and hiring an artist whose work you admire to paint directly on the white fondant (using edible paints of course which can be obtained through a baking supply store). These are obvious trends in the world of weddings.

Some wedding trends are a little less obvious. For example, for years despite the fact that most couples chose to marry on a Saturday there have always been a few who would choose to marry on other days.

My husband's grandparents, for example, chose to marry on a Sunday right after church. Instead of dismissing the congregation at the end of the service, the pastor simply announced they would be having a wedding and asked the bride to step down out of the choir loft as the groom stepped to the front. It was simple. It was green wedding (since no one wasted extra fuel to get there), whatever other opinion we might have about the option.

But this year there have been a marked increase in weddings held on days other than Saturday. Why this wedding trend? I can only speculate. I know that many wedding venues offer greatly reduced fees on days other than Saturdays. I know this is one of the reasons. I've seen websites that advocate getting married on Friday night to save money on the wedding. But do you really? In some situations you might, but such a choice almost limits you to the bigger, more expensive florists, photographers, planners, and pastry chefs because the individuals who intentionally limit their practice to what they can do outside a day job to preserve the joy of the craft are quite often unavailable do to the need to make a living at a different job.

Another cost of this trend of non-Saturday wedding is the simple fact that not only do some professionals intentionally limit their practice and have to work - but most, if not all, of your guests do to and if anyone has to travel a wedding anytime other than Saturday might not be practical for them to be able to get to and from your wedding

I know that people often have their own personal reason for choosing the date - like the desire to share an anniversary date with a parent or sibling. And if your reason is personal, go for it. Just recognize that every choice has it's cost and you are better off weighing all the costs before you make your choice.

How Do We Create A "Green" Wedding?

With all of the talk today of global warming and environmental impact the question looms: "How do we create a 'green' wedding? How do we put together a ceremony and celebration that will linger in our memories but leave little to no impact on the environment?

The answer, whether we like it or not, is simplicity. Create a simple wedding with your own personal touch to make your wedding memorable rather than trying to out stage last year's big wedding productions. - and besides for potential protection to the environment, a simple 'green' wedding can save you lots of money! The reason for this, as you will see, is that a green wedding is concerned with what's good for the community and environment rather than with keeping up with the Jones' - whoever they are.

There is no way to cover every possible situation but consider these three possible scenario's set in the urban, suburban, and rural settings as inspiration for your green wedding:

Urban Setting for Your Green Wedding:

Plan a period themed wedding from your own city's history. For example, 19th century wedding theme. Design your dress based around the theme - not a problem, wedding dresses are special order anyway - and remember, you don't have to choose to emulate the rich of that period, just something representative or suggestive of the period. Choose a local hall with lots of windows within walking distance of your borough or neighborhood to ... more