Here goes…

1. No more ‘supposed to’

…says Ariel Meadow Stallings, the Offbeat Bride who had a ‘bridentity crisis’ on getting engaged:

“Suddenly I was supposed to care about floral arrangements and classical quartets.  Suddenly I was supposed to like poufy white dresses and showing off jewelry.  Suddenly I was supposed to buy five-hundred-page glossy magazines and take a strong interest in decorative bows for the backs of rented chairs.”

Happily it didn’t take Ariel too long to realise that she didn’t have to be someone else on her wedding day.

“Once I realized that we could craft the wedding that we wanted (and not what others expected), the whole process got a lot easier.  There was no need to read the glossy magazines for ideas – I already knew what I cared about.  The issue was just figuring out how to share that with my friends and family in a way that everyone could enjoy.”

A bonus of this approach in our book (which we haven’t written yet – watch this space!) is that it tends to make your special day a whole lot cheaper and greener.

2. Embrace the Retro Wedding

Jen Marsden of Green Guide for Weddings reckons that our current retromania could be a blessing for the planet.  Jen says:

“When 900,000 million items of perfectly good clothing, shoes and accessories are thrown away these days it makes sense keeping stuff that will become popular again […]. 

“Whilst not suggesting that the bridegroom wears his 1980s hideously patterned shell suit to the altar there are some class pieces from the 1950s […] Think Sinatra, Martin and the crooners – if their style still looks good then so can yours.

“Vintage doesn’t have to be expensive.  Beyond Retro opened in 2000 in a warehouse in East London where they sell a wide range of vintage clothing and accessories for men and women.  Their vintage wedding items are available from £18 to £120 and they sell vintage veils, silk flowers, headpieces and shoes [too].”

If you’re going to buy vintage online, heed these words of wisdom from Wenona Napolitano of The Everything Green Wedding Book:

“Ask what condition the gown is in, how fragile the material is, and whether the dress is wearable (some people just collect vintage gowns they don’t plan to wear).  Above all, do not rely on sizes.  Get measurements.  Sizes mean nothing in vintage gowns because they don’t even come close to modern size charts. […] Over time, people have gotten taller and thicker […].  Vintage styles are often very small and are made for shorter women.  Make sure you have accurate measurements of yourself.”

Wenona shares more tips on choosing a vintage gown in her article for Ethical Weddings: “Totally vintageous – search for an eco chic wedding gown”

We say, for more vintage inspiration and bargains, head to one of the many vintage fairs going on in 2012 – we’ve a growing list here (among other ethical, green and alternative wedding events).

3. Take your vows in a green church

If you’re going for a traditional church wedding, that’s no reason to stop asking your green questions.  Jen says:

“Now that churches have gained their fair trade status, they are looking at the whole green cycle – from procurement to combating climate change.

“There are now over 100 churches in the UK that promise to include environmental considerations daily into their prayers, as set out by the organisation, Eco Congregation.  With activists amongst its clergy, The Green Church of the Year (awarded by Church Times in 2007) went to the Holy Trinity in Cleeve, Somerset.”

• See more Green Church Award winners
• Find out about the Church of England’s National Environmental Campaign, Shrinking the Footprint
• Visit the Eco Congregation website

4. Think outside the vase

When it comes to weddings, flowers can be a pesticide-ridden, carbon-hungry minefield.  So it’s useful to try a little lateral thinking.  One bride, Danielle, shares her floral story in Organic Weddings: Balancing Ecology, Style and Tradition by Michelle Kozin:

“I wanted organic, locally grown flowers for my late-fall wedding but none of the florists in the area were interested in helping me because it would be just past the local growing season.

“I approached a woman selling flowers at a local farmer’s market about doing dried bouquets and arrangements from her summer flowers that dried well.  She had never done a wedding before but was really excited to have the opportunity.

“Everything looked beautiful and very unique!”

Michelle also gives tips on growing your own flowers, and suggests reusing your arrangements by moving them from the ceremony to the reception and then to your local hospital or nursing home, choosing potted plants for centrepieces that can be given as gifts and replanted, and using fabric flowers or vintage pins instead of boutonnieres and corsages.

5. Have your organic cake and eat it too

If you’re making your own cake, Michelle suggests simply taking a traditional recipe and substituting organic ingredients.  If you’re not feeling up to the role of master baker for your wedding day, she says:

“If you are searching for an organic baker, but can’t locate one, ask a conventional baker if they are willing to purchase organic and natural ingredients for your cake.  Even if only half of the ingredients can be organic, go for it.  Half is better than none.

“You may find a baker who is interested in helping you and in learning to source ingredients for an organic cake.  Local health and natural food stores in your area should carry necessary baking products.”

6. Get a little bit crafty

The Everything Green Wedding Book’s Wenona is a big fan of handmade nuptials and she believes wedding DIY is one way for a couple to get even closer in the run-up to their marriage.

“Green couples really seem to be in touch with the DIY wedding by planting flowers or growing fresh herbs in pots to give away as favors, or by making handmade paper for their invitations.

“Making beautiful handcrafted elements for your wedding as a couple is a wonderful way to bond and spend quality time together while planning your big day. 

“It is also a great way to relax and de-stress in the midst of planning a large event.  Chances are you are extremely busy , hustling around between appointments, fittings, and normal day-to-day living.  Crafting is a way to slow down and concentrate on absolutely nothing but the task at hand.”

7. Have a cyberdelic wedding

Mireya Navarro, New York Times Style correspondent and author of Green Wedding – Planning your eco-friendly celebration has a solution for couples who are hankering after a big wedding with all their friends and family but don’t want the carbon (or financial) cost: live streaming.

Mireya says:

“A wedding webcast may sound kind of fringe, but it allows you to cut down your guest list and still have all of your loved ones be part of the event (kind of). […]

“One company, www.WebcastMyWedding.net, has technicians who can travel to your wedding to take care of the webcast […] The company also allows you to handle the webcast yourself for a fraction of the price […].  The owner, Ariel J. Andres […] says that all couples need for the live streaming is a video camera, a laptop, and a high-speed Internet connection.  After reserving a webcast channel, a couple can create their webpage and e-mail invitations with the time and date of the event so that guests know when to log on.”

For obvious reasons this approach is particularly popular for destination weddings but Mireya also gives the example of a couple who, “wanted to save money, so they had only eight relatives and close friends at their wedding in Santa Monica, California, but broadcast the beach ceremony to more than one hundred online guests.”

8. Be a green inspiration, not a green bore

So you’re having a green wedding but should you tell your guests or wait to dazzle them with your eco chic style when they ask you where you got your fabulous (charity shop actually) wedding dress or your (made them ourselves from organic cotton and home-grown lavender) favours?

New York Times Style guru, Mireya says:

“The wedding offers a chance to educate friends and relatives not yet clued in to terms like ‘post-consumer recycled paper,’ but how can you do this without a Power Point presentation between courses?

“Kelly Nichols and Alan Puccinelli of California used their wedding website to show ‘How we’re being eco-friendly’. It explained that the venue composted on-site.  It mentioned the organic menu and the bio-degradable wood stir-sticks for drinks.  And under ‘What can you do?’ it included tips such as ‘ride our chartered bus’ and ‘wear a dress you already own’.”

9. Drink and be merry

Kate L. Harrison, author of The Green Bride Guide has these tips for a sustainable tipple to celebrate your newly-wed status:

“If you live in an area that grows wine, it is nice to support a local vineyard.  If you are having a vineyard wedding, the wine will probably be part of the package, but even if you are having your wedding somewhere else, you can ask for or provide locally grown wine.”

And do opt for organic if you can…

“Grapes are one of the most pesticide-heavy crops in the world. […] Organic wine is made from grapes that have been grown without the use of chemical pesticides, fertilizer, and herbicides. 

“Most organic wines also have fewer suliftes, because they cannot add additional preservatives, which is good for people who are prone to wine headaches.”

(We say: so your guests will thank you for it the next day too!)

10. Don’t forget to smile

We like Kate’s easy-to-action tip on the photography front.  Go digital.  She says:

“Although some photographers are still wed to film-based photography (and may try to convince you it is better), digital technology has evolved to the point that the vast majority of professional photographers […] use digital cameras.

“Film processing requires toxic chemicals, takes a long time, costs more, and does not yield higher-quality results.  By staying digital, your photographer can quickly and easily delete unwanted images, provide you with proofs, color correct, and post all of the photos on the web.  With digital photography, only the pictures you want are printed, saving additional resources.”

She finishes with the recommendation that green couples ditch the disposable cameras.  It’s common sense as nearly everyone has a digital camera these days – there is absolutely no need to give your guests even more of an excuse to become paparazzi for the day.

11. Think location, location, location

Suzan St Maur in How to get married in green: Have an eco-friendly wedding without compromising on style has a useful check list of things to consider when looking for a suitably green wedding venue:

• Avoid choosing a location abroad, even if you’re combining wedding and honeymoon.
• Pick a location that’s easily accessed by the majority of your guests.
• Organise a “park & ride” arrangement for guests, especially if the location is far from home.
• Pick a location that’s easily accessed by public transport.
• Choose a reception location within as short a distance as possible of the ceremony location.
• Think twice about having your reception at home if you have to bring in all facilities.
• If having a civil  wedding, arrange ceremony and reception in same location.
• Ensure reception location has a proper recycling policy.
• Ensure reception location catering uses local, preferably organic produce.
• See if you can “double up” with other couples getting married at around the same time, for things like flowers and decorations.

12. Tuck in with a difference

The format for a wedding has become rather fixed in recent years: ceremony, reception with sit-down meal, dancing until the early hours with more food (even though everybody is still full to bursting from the huge reception meal which inevitably finished hours later than it was supposed to).

But it wasn’t always like that – my parents married in the 1970s, had the ceremony, a lunch with friends and family and then headed off on their honeymoon to Northumberland… in November.  Simpler times!

Suzan offers us some refreshing alternatives to today’s standard wedding timetable:

“Brunch receptions – From a green point of view they are helpful because they are held from late morning to early afternoon, so requiring less in the way of artificial light.  From a catering point of view they can encompass pretty well anything you like,  from organic free range eggs and locally-cured bacon on locally made organic toasted bread… to a full lunch menu.  The style is less formal than the traditional afternoon/evening reception, and there is usually less alcohol consumption. […]

“Tea receptions – This may seem like a quirky idea but it does cut back on the cost of food and drink and is a lovely variant […] Food wise you serve everything you would at a formal tea party, which in this case can be produced from locally sourced and made sandwiches, cakes, pastries and sweets. Organic tea is the main drink which can be supplemented by alcohol if required.  The time frame for this type of reception is mid-afternoon until early evening […]”

We would also suggest that the less formal and traditional style of these receptions alters guests’ expectations which could take off the pressure if you or your friends and family fancy taking on some of the catering yourselves.

Phew.  So there you have it – 12 top tips for 2012 weddings from our green wedding gurus.  A big thank you to all of them for their wise words.

If you have more fantastic, eco-friendly tips that you really shouldn’t keep to yourself, please share them in the comments below.

Happy planning!

Katie

What next?

• Sign up to receive our monthly Ethical Weddings newsletter
• Search the Ethical Weddings Suppliers Directory
• Read real ethical wedding stories

To take advantage of this offer all you need to do is book natural-photos for your wedding by 31 December 2010 (you don’t have to get married by then – just make your booking!).

Find out more about natural-photos here

Katie

Seasonal wedding flowers

The church was beautiful, we found a florist who was a friend of my parents, and who was sympathetic to our green ideas.

She sourced flowers and greenery as seasonally as possible, including some raided from my parents’ garden the previous day (!), and also made up some planters of growing flowers and herbs that we took away to keep afterwards.  The results were stunning.

A very personal wedding ceremony

Our church wedding was fantastic too.  As we are both Christians, the spiritual aspect of marriage was really important to us, so getting married in church was particularly special.

The service was wonderful – our friend and university chaplain led the service so he was able to tailor it to us quite a lot (his address to the congregation after the marriage involved Bagpuss!) – and as there is quite a lot of choice about what wording to use for the marriage service, and which readings (Bible or not) and music to use, the whole thing felt very personal.

We entered the church to the Beatles’ ‘Here comes the sun’ in the end, very happy! We involved friends and family in leading the readings, prayers and music too, which was lovely.  We exchanged wedding rings from Cred (who really impressed us), and our little ‘engagement ring’ trees made it along to the church too as decorations.  And we made our own service sheets (using Evolve recycled printer paper), including our story in them.

Snap happy guests

After the ceremony we did a big photo session in the pretty churchyard, with my keen amateur photographer uncle doing the ‘posed’ photos, and the rest of our photos taken by the guests who then posted their digital photos on to us.

It worked out really well, despite what you hear about how you must get in a professional.  With so many people doing your photos you are bound to have a fantastic selection of shots, and they covered different groups of guests, as well as getting some fantastic informal pics to add to the posed ones.

Homemade confetti

We had made our own confetti the previous summer, by drying rose petals in the oven and storing them in warm, dark and dry boxes. We decorated the boxes we stored it in with some shiny red paper from Oxfam (again – they did well out of us!) to make pretty serving boxes to pass round for guests to pick out handfuls from.  And it was so beautiful, the colours were preserved really well.

The cherry tree in the churchyard decided to add to our confetti and showered us with blossom as soon as we stepped out of the church, which was VERY cute.  It made a wonderful backdrop to the photos too.

Love,

Helen and Mike

If so, we’d like to invite you to enter our Eco Chic Wedding & Home Show Photography Competition to see your photographs featured in our 2010 wedding shows.

We loved the look for 2009 (above) but we thought it was time to shake things up a bit for 2010 – which is where you come in!

Live and Let Die ipod How does it work?
We want to see your photos that you feel represent the spirit of a green, ethical and eco chic wedding.

It might be a bride on a bike, a reception in a working windmill, table decorations with plants in pots rather than cut flowers, or just a beautiful unspoilt British beach with the happy couple getting their feet wet… let your imagination run wild!

They could be photos you already have in your collection, ones you know you’ll have soon from an upcoming green wedding, or shots you set up just for this purpose.

What’s the prize?
Crossroads hd
The winning photographer(s) will…

Twelve and Holding rip
• see their photos in the Show Guide, on the Show website and potentially in national newspapers (a number of which covered the show in 2009 – see our Press Section)
• be credited in our Show Guide that goes out to every couple who visits the Show
• be credited on the Show website (www.ecochicweddingandhomeshow.com) with your logo and a link back to your website
• get free copies of the Show Guide for their personal use

What do I need to do?

Cellular hd

Breakin’ All the Rules film

• Submit your photos (low resolution – no more than 500kb – high resolution images will be requested if successful) to katie at ethicalweddings.com
• Outline your commitment to green and ethical issues and how this affects your work as a photographer (up to 250 words)
• Confirm that you own the copyright to the photos and may use them as you see fit without restrictions
• Confirm that you are happy for the photos to be uploaded to Flickr, Facebook and/or other online photography display site for judging purposes

The deadline

Freezer Burn: The Invasion of Laxdale ipod

All photos must be submitted by 31 July 2009

Who are the judges?
The winning photos will be selected by the Eco Chic Wedding & Home Show Team with assistance from ethical wedding couples who will vote on their favourites.

We can’t wait to see your ethical wedding photos!

Katie & Kate
Eco Chic Wedding & Home Show Team

This week we are joined by Andrew Sansom – ethical wedding photographer extraordinaire.

As well as being on top of the ethical and green issues related to photography, Andrew has a handle on all the usual stresses and strains of planning a wedding – including (rather topically given the recent downpours) what to do in wet weather!

For more wedding tips and stories, over to Andrew…

Your name: Andrew Sansom
Location: Reading, Berkshire

Tell us a bit about yourself and your business
I became a photographer after 15 years as an accountant. I decided if I was going to work for another 30 years it should be at something I enjoy.

I enjoy each wedding I photograph and this is reflected in the quality of the photos and the level of customer service I provide.

What or who inspires you?
Growing up in New Zealand a lot of inspiration came from national heroes such as the late Sir Edmund Hillary.

Although most famous for climbing Mount Everest, Hillary was quoted as taking more pride from the projects he became involved with in Nepal, building schools, medical centres and similar in deprived areas.

Click move

As I get older, issues such as equality, peace, poverty, conservation and the environment have become very important to me, so anyone past or present working as selflessly as possible in those areas is inspirational.

What do you enjoy most about running your business?
Waking up in the morning looking forward to work is a special feeling, and is a result of the variety of experiences from the different types of photography I do.

The Ambushers release

I enjoy being able to make a difference through my photography. This can be anything from capturing the emotions of a wedding, to memories of other events, to being able to help charities through photographing their work.

What is the most challenging aspect?
Even when you enjoy your work, self-discipline can still be a challenge, and I still find “selling myself” quite difficult at times.

What do you feel you bring to an ethical wedding?
When you are self employed there is often little distinction between the business person and the private person. “Ethical” for me therefore includes:

• treating every customer, supplier and other business contacts as I would want to be treated
• using work practices and suppliers that are as ethical as possible
• considering the importance of fairness, green/environmental issues, equality, respect, and general ethics in all my business and personal behaviour

Ethical means different things to different people, and sometimes we have to be pragmatic about it, but the key is acting on as many of our “good intentions” as we can.

How do you see the wedding industry changing over the next five years (if at all)?
Scarecrow ipod 2012 prophecy
The industry has changed almost beyond recognition in the past five years mainly due to digital technology.

Irrespective of economic conditions, there is far more competition, particularly from part-time photographers, and as a result there is considerable downward pressure on prices.

As professionals we have to educate couples as to the importance of using a professional, and concentrate even harder on “over-delivering” both in terms of quality of work, and in customer service.

It isn’t enough just to be an excellent photographer. We must have excellent people skills as well.

Whatever happens in the industry, the ideal for any photographer is having happy couples recommending you to their friends, families and colleagues.

• Poster Boy dvd

You can also find Andrew in the photography section of the recently released book, ‘How to get married in green’

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Find out more about Andrew Sansom – ethical wedding photography

• purpendicular deep purple mp3 download

To close this challenge I thought it was appropriate to search for fair trade photograph albums and frames…

Albums
Rose Petal Album from Myakka

Wedding Album from Fairly Goods

Mother of Pearl Album (also in red) from Ganesha

Handmade paper Album from Shared Earth

Gold blockprint Album from People Tree

Satin & Bamboo Album from Sunlover

Indian; Nepalese; Sri Lankan albums from Paper High

Photo Frames

Mackintosh Photo frame from Fairly Goods

Mother of Pearl Photo frame from Ganesha

Wooden photo frames from Shared Earth

Double flowers frame from Shared Earth

Batik Photo Frames from Anjuna

and that’s the end… of my Fairtrade Fortnight Fair Trade Wedding Challenge!

See you here a little later for a few closing thoughts, but in the meantime please forward this link to spread the ‘fair trade wedding’ word!

Alex