Your wedding is a day to celebrate your relationship and future happiness together. It makes sense that this event will indulge in a bit of excess. No one needs everything that makes a typical wedding, but it is fun and sentimental and not everything in life has to be necessary. However, indulging in yourself doesn’t have to hurt the environment. With a bit of intentional planning, you can have a beautiful, unforgettable wedding and help save the planet at the same time!
Ditch the Paper
Planning a wedding takes a ton of paper. Most couples opt for the traditional wedding planning binder, along with all the save-the-dates, invitations, and RSVPs. You can easily cut back without sacrificing the quality of the event. First of all, ditch that binder. There are tons of useful wedding planning apps that you can access from the cloud and store all your information. This saves you the hassle of carrying another item everywhere with you.
Next, think about what paper invites are really necessary. Save-the-dates and invitations can be great mementos, but RSVPs can be done online. Likewise, invitations to supplemental events (like bridal showers, bachelor and bachelorette parties, and morning-after brunches) can be sent through email. You can find free, customizable bachelorette party email invitations to match the personality of any group! This also allows you to send different invites to suit the personalities of each of your bridesmaids.
Decorate with Reuse in Mind
When you are planning your decor, try to get as many used products as possible. Check out buy-sell groups on social media and classifieds in your area. This will not only benefit the environment but save you money as well!
Before you buy anything, think about what you will do with it after the wedding. Don’t purchase anything that has to be immediately thrown away. Find things you can sell, donate, or reuse yourself. Consider renting linens, or if you buy them, rent them out for other local events. This can help offset the cost of your wedding decor.
After the wedding, look at everything and think about how it can be repurposed. Used candles can be finished up or melted down into new candles or even turned into crayons. Make a shadowbox displaying key elements of your decor.
Minimize Gift Waste
Many people are foregoing the traditional gift registry and asking for funds for their honeymoon, instead. This is large because more and more people have already built a home together when they get married, so they don’t need more material possessions. You could also ask for a donation to your favorite environmental organization in lieu of gifts.
Even if you are going the traditional registry route, you can encourage your guest to forego wrapping paper or use unconventional, reusable gift-wrapping methods.
Plan a Sustainable Honeymoon
Planning a sustainable vacation can be tricky, especially if you are flying and/or going somewhere with a bustling tourist industry. It can be done, though! Research places with environmental initiatives you can participate in. If you are going to an island, spend a couple of hours at a beach cleanup. Donate to local causes. Spend at local businesses instead of non-local chains. Even fun activities like surfing can be done with sustainable ethics in mind.
These are just a few of the many ways you can prevent your wedding from being a bane to the environment. Have more sustainable wedding ideas? Share in the comments!
