Greenwatch: Perfect Wedding magazine
Dec 3rd, 2012 by Katie
We’re starting a new monthly column called ‘Greenwatch’ where we find out how green and ethical wedding companies and ideas are sneaking into mainstream wedding media.
We’ll be checking out the glossy wedding magazines (good excuse for a guilty pleasure) as well as some of the biggest, non-alternative, wedding blogs.
The counterpart to this column will be ‘Stuff I don’t need for my wedding‘ picking up and casting aside crazy ‘wedding must-haves’ as found in misdirected press releases, wedding mags (another excuse…) and hopefully your suggestions if you stumble across any really-must-not-haves as you plan your wedding.
Perfect Wedding magazine
This month we’re a bit behind but we couldn’t resist sharing our findings from the November issue of Perfect Wedding magazine – it’s choc full of eco ideas! So here goes…
On the cover
Real-life brides – “I planned a glam vintage theme and saved £2k”
Reading between the lines, the bride in question recycles/reuses by going vintage and sticks to a sensible budget rather than splashing cash on anything that has the word ‘wedding’ attached to it. A good message to get out there we feel!
Inside
One of their contributors is Sanyukta Shrestha, a bridalwear designer who uses Fairtrade and environmentally-friendly fabrics.
Alice – hemp silk strapless wedding gown with sweetheart neckline
Her current collection is inspired by the style of Wallis Simpson.
Alternative bouquets
On page 43 we find 3 alternative bouquets including a fabric, keep forever, peony bouquet by Innstyches at Etsy. A little pricey at £125 but it’s not going to end up on the compost heap after the big day.
For more alternative bouquets, see our Pinterest board: Eco bouquets
How real brides got luxe for less
This is the cover story – a fab feature about four brides who saved money but still had a beautiful bash by doing some DIY, roping in friends and family, and raiding the charity shops. Here are some examples of what they got up to:
- made centrepieces from charity shop plates
- mother-in-law sewed over 60 metres of bunting
- made favours by painting motifs on champagne flutes and filling with tiny cake pops
- husband made the wedding cake
- bought a vintage wedding gown and hired a headdress
- bought earrings and husband’s wedding ring from antique shop, bride’s wedding ring came from great-grandmother
- friend made the top tier of the cake, remaining tiers filled with homemade brownies
- father-of-the-groom made wooden invitations, table names painted in watercolours by groom’s godmother
- no waiting staff, friends and family helped out
Well done those brides!
More real-life weddings
6 more detailed real-life wedding stories follow and each has a quirky or thrifty element to it.
Hannah & David
Hannah gets her dress from The Vintage Wedding Dress Company and the couple include lots of Sussex cheeses in their evening buffet to celebrate the local food culture. They make their own place cards and use a vintage suitcase for their DIY table plan.
Lizzy & Daniel
To decorate their venue they make pom-poms from tissue paper and with the left over paper they make confetti. Lizzy finds lots of vintage glass vases for the tables.
Gemma & Dan
They sew over 100 metres of bunting to decorate the venue and make confetti from vintage books from Not on the High Street. They ditch the favours when they realise how much they will cost!
Zoe & Scott
They make lots of the decorations themselves – including giant pom poms. Flowers are displayed in tin cans. Zoe gives her bridesmaids a length of the blue ribbon they’re using for decorations and asks them to choose their own dresses to match – making it more likely they’ll get something they can wear again.
Madeline & Daniel
Get married from Madeline’s family home with guests sitting on straw bales in the orchard. Decorate the marquee with handmade bunting, ‘jam jars, jugs and milk churns full of English cottage garden flowers’.
Lucy & Kevin
Try to make as many as possible of the details of the wedding themselves – including all their own invites, orders of the day and place cards.
2013 trends
Among the trends predicted for 2013 we have seasonal, British, even home grown blooms for the flowers and a joyous mismatch in the wedding details which could mean charity shop crockery, homemade favours and centrepieces borrowed from friends and family – giving the day a special, personal touch.
Paper corsages from The Story House
Paper petals fill another page – from corsages to bouquets to place settings they can serve as a good, eco alternative to the real thing, especially if it’s recycled paper!
So thank you Perfect Wedding for getting the green wedding word out. Though I did get told off on page 45: ‘Guests who wear white – It’s just not done. There’s always one though. Tsk.‘ Oops, I’ve been that one a few times! Not a long dress with a veil though, usually something mid-calf with a pattern, but still white, sorry. I didn’t wear white on my own wedding day though – does that let me off the hook?
Katie
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