Ask The Experts: How to Have a Low Waste Wedding

Sustainability is BIG at the moment, and hopefully will stay that way forever! You may do your best to live a sustainable, eco friendly life, but what happens when it comes to planning your wedding? Many couples dream of weddings with extravagant decorations and details, but they can leave a significant carbon footprint behind. So how do you go about planning a low waste wedding? Use these tips if you’re planning a low-waste wedding and need inspiration. You can manage every last detail of your big day without compromising your eco-friendly values.

How to Have a Low-Waste Wedding

Buy a Used Wedding Dress

Wedding dresses are some of the most costly parts of wedding budgets. Brides often spend thousands of pounds on a gown they’ll wear once. Afterward, it ends up in an attic or a landfill.
Avoid this form of wedding waste by searching for a used dress that matches your bridal style. You’ll look incredible and help the planet.

OPT FOR SECONDHAND RINGS

Second-hand or preowned rings can be another great addition to a low-waste wedding. These rings have already been created and do not require new resources to be mined or processed, making them a sustainable and eco-friendly choice. Plus, they often have unique designs and history, making them a meaningful and special choice for your big day. Consider checking out vintage or antique jewellery stores to find the perfect estate ring for you and your partner.

Send Digital Invitations

Paper invitations are a wedding tradition that isn’t great for the environment. You’ll contribute to deforestation by printing multiple copies of your invitations and sealing them in envelopes for mailing. Send digital invitations instead to save a few trees. They could also benefit your budget if you don’t spend a dime by sending a group email to your guests.

Preserve Your Wedding Flowers

Your flower arrangements will be a beautiful part of your wedding day. What happens to them afterward? They become waste because the water and land resources that helped them grow only contribute floral trash to landfills.
Instead of throwing out your flowers after your reception, consider preserving them. You can do it at home for free by pressing them between books and saving them in frames. Some brides also reuse their flowers by drying them in the microwave for easy storage in scrapbooks.

Ask for Donations

People are likely already asking where they can find your registry. They want to get you and your fiance wedding gifts that you need or love, but that’s another way weddings hurt the environment. Presents involve single-use wrapping paper and accompanying cards. It destroys trees and contributes more garbage to landfills.
Request that everyone provides donations instead of traditional gifts. They can find a link on your wedding website to donate to your honeymoon fund. You could even use their contributions to purchase your first house or achieve another milestone in your relationship.
If you don’t want to do any of that, you could also provide links on your website to your favorite charities that fight climate change. Depending on what the charities do, they could be a powerful form of carbon offsetting for your wedding.

Purchase Local Food

Carbon dioxide pollution doesn’t have to be an unavoidable part of your wedding. Minimize how much CO2 comes from transporting your wedding food by purchasing from local farms. They won’t travel as far or burn as much gas to get everything to your venue on time.

Use Sustainable Beauty Products

Makeup and hair experts will help you achieve your bridal look for your wedding. No matter what you have in mind, their products will influence your low-waste wedding. Creating makeup and hair care products requires natural resources and may include chemicals that aren’t biodegradable. Those ingredients hurt the planet twice by washing into water systems when brides remove their makeup after their reception.
You can always find or request sustainable beauty products to align your style with your eco-friendly values. Look for brands that feature green labels like:

• Non-toxic
• Biodegradable
• Ethical sourcing

If a company’s history and values match your sustainable goals, its products could be a great addition to your eco-friendly wedding. Remember to bring them home and reuse them to reduce your waste further.

Request Recycling Bins

There’s no avoiding the fact that weddings create rubbish. Your guests will throw out leftover food on their plates, empty drink containers and other single-use items that are part of the day. However, much of that trash could become recycled products.
See which venues already have recycling bins and which don’t. If you fall in love with one that doesn’t, you can always talk with the management team about partnering with a local recycling plant for a one-time pickup. It may be an added venue fee, but having a low-waste wedding will be worth it.

Hire Eco-Friendly Transportation

CO2 waste also happens when everyone drives to a wedding. Guests usually take multiple cars plus a few planes to attend their loved one’s big day. Although you can’t control which transportation methods they need to reach your destination, you can reduce their fossil fuel usage by renting eco-friendly transportation from their hotel to your venue.
Find a green van to shuttle everyone back and forth. They’ll use less gas and won’t run the risk of driving away from your reception after drinking. Another great eco friendly alternative is an electric car; it can especially come in handy if you don’t need too big of a vehicle. It’s another innovative way to care for your guests and the planet in one move.

There are numerous ways to have a low-waste wedding. You only have to start planning with the planet in mind. Consider utilizing tips like drying your flowers, finding a used gown and selecting sustainable products to minimize your wedding’s environmental footprint.

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