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My wedding dress is not very eco-friendly and this caused me a lot of grief and green guilt.

But I decided to keep it and be happy about it since it is beautiful, suits me perfectly, made my mother-in-law cry and is from Monsoon.  Also when I found out that Monsoon apart from doing lovely clothes also have some very good ethical policies I was convinced.

Furthermore, I got a chance to visit the Oxfam Bridal store in Southampton and found myself a really nice pair of shoes there.

To go with the outfit I have bought a lovely natural coloured hemp rayon pashmina from Braintree Hemp who I think make some marvellous clothes.

I have several blouses from there already and my father swears by their men’s shirts.

I have also crocheted my own retro bridal gloves, which I hope will become a family heirloom.  I got the pattern off Hook Yarn and Needles and I have blogged about it elsewhere.

For him

John’s suit is not very eco-friendly either and he told me not to check Next’s ethical profile. I did however, and was pleasantly surprised to discover that they have an ethical trading profile and support projects in Africa.

It would of course have been wonderful if he could have had a locally tailored suit made out of some fair trade or organic material but it was out of our price range.  On the other hand he will be using his new suit for a long, long time, which makes it worthwhile.

One thing he did find was a very nice white shirt from Braintree Hemp, which he will wear with the suit.

He also ordered a waistcoat from Spirals of Abundance made from nettle fibres.  It was great but we had to send it back because their smallest size, which looked like it had the right chest size, was made for a much shorter and wider man.

At the end of the big day…

The two main considerations here have been style and money with the ethical considerations coming in in third place.

I have for the last couple of years been dreaming about a Monsoon wedding dress. They are so perfectly simple and stylish and cost a fraction of the average wedding dress.

We have also tried to source certain things from ethical shops like Braintree Hemp, but I was very disappointed to see how few fashionable ethical clothes there are out there for men. It is mostly a market for babies with more and more stylish clothes coming through for women.

Read Henriette and John’s full profile

or talk ethical bridalwear in the Ethical Weddings Forum