Eco-Friendly Wedding Ideas for the Sustainable Bride & Groom
As more couples embrace sustainable living, eco-friendly weddings have become an increasingly popular trend. Planning a wedding can be resource-intensive, but with thoughtful choices, you can significantly reduce your environmental impact without compromising on style or elegance. Whether you’re passionate about the environment or simply want to minimise waste, there are plenty of ways to make your wedding day more sustainable.
In this guide, we’ll explore eco-friendly wedding ideas for the sustainable bride and groom, covering everything from venues and decor to catering and attire.
1. Choose a Sustainable Wedding Venue
The venue sets the stage for your wedding day, and selecting a sustainable one can make a big impact.
Eco-Friendly Venues: Choose a venue that prioritises sustainability, such as those with renewable energy sources, waste-reduction programs, or on-site recycling. Coco Weddings has a list of venues that classify themselves as eco-friendly.
Outdoor Weddings: Consider hosting your wedding outdoors in a natural setting such as a park, beach, or botanical garden. These settings reduce the need for extensive decor and lighting, saving both energy and resources; but you will need to consider the size of your guestlist and logistics for hosting something like this in a public place such as a park. There may be restrictions or rules that you need to take into consideration, so always check with your local council as to what’s allowed if you’re unsure.
2. Reduce Your Guest List
A smaller guest list means less food, less waste, and fewer resources used. Keeping your wedding intimate not only helps you reduce your carbon footprint but also creates a more personal, meaningful celebration.
You can also consider having a later start time, to reduce the amount of food served (and therefore potentially wasted).
3. Digital Invitations
Traditional paper invitations often lead to a significant amount of waste. Instead, opt for digital wedding invitations, which save both trees and money.
E-invites: Services like Greenvelope provide elegant digital invitations with a wide variety of customisable designs. They also track RSVPs, making the process simpler for you and your guests.
Both Hitched & Bridebook allow you to create wedding websites which allow guests to RSVP and gives them all of the details they’ll need to attend your special day.
If you feel like some family members, possibly the ones who are more technologically challenged, would prefer physical invitations, you can print a smaller number on services like Vistaprint for a small fee and even hand deliver them to save on postage if your relatives live close by! It might be a nice keepsake for you to have a printed invite for a scrapbook too.
4. Sustainable Wedding Stationery
If you prefer physical invitations, choose eco-friendly materials.
Recycled Paper: Use 100% recycled or plantable paper for your invitations. Plantable paper is embedded with seeds, allowing guests to plant the invitation and grow wildflowers after the wedding.
Soy-Based Inks: Opt for invitations printed with soy-based inks, which are more environmentally friendly than traditional inks.
5. Upcycled or Vintage Wedding Dress
The wedding dress is a significant part of the day, but that doesn't mean it has to be brand new. Embrace sustainability with your attire by considering the following:
Pre-Loved Gowns: Sites like Still White allow brides to buy and sell pre-loved wedding dresses. You can find designer gowns at a fraction of the cost while reducing waste.
Vintage Dresses: Consider wearing a vintage or family heirloom dress. Vintage gowns not only add a touch of history to your day but are also an eco-friendly choice. Depending on who owns the dress, you could have it modified to suit your style, whilst still retaining it’s character. A friend of mine wore her mother’s wedding dress, but she’d had it altered to suit her style.
6. Eco-Friendly Bridesmaid Dresses
“You can shorten it and wear it again!” - every bride to her bridesmaids regarding their dresses.
Sustainability extends to your bridal party attire. Look for eco-friendly brands that use sustainable materials, like organic cottons or GOTS certified fabrics, or choose dresses your bridesmaids can actually wear again.
Re-wearable Dresses: Pick dresses that are versatile enough for your bridesmaids to wear again to other events, reducing single-use clothing. This means choosing both a colour and fabric that could be altered (such as shortened) to make a dress suitable for other engagements.
7. Rent Your Wedding Attire
For both the bride and groom, renting attire is a great eco-friendly option. Not only does it cut down on waste, but it’s also a budget-friendly choice.
Groom’s Suit Rentals: Many grooms opt to rent their suit or tuxedo, which reduces the demand for fast fashion and one-time wear items. Moss Bros offers a wide range of rental options in the UK.
Pick a colour that can be re-worn. Black, navy, grey and beige suits are versatile options that can be worn again, so if you prefer to buy your suit, choose something you think you’d be able to reuse down the line!
8. Eco-Friendly Wedding Rings
Your wedding rings are a lasting symbol of your marriage, so choosing sustainably sourced metals and conflict-free diamonds is essential.
Ethical Jewellery: Brands like Ingle & Rhode specialise in ethical wedding rings made from Fairtrade gold and lab-grown diamonds.
Moissanites are another sustainable option for engagement and wedding rings. Moissanites are a fraction of the cost of diamonds, are always 100% conflict-free and can be made into rings using sustainable metals. Full disclosure, I have a moissanite engagement ring and will also have moissanites in my wedding band. I love them and I love knowing for a fact that they are 100% conflict-free.
9. Sustainable Catering
The food at your wedding can have a huge environmental impact, but there are plenty of ways to make catering more sustainable.
Seasonal & Local: Opt for a caterer that uses seasonal, locally sourced ingredients to minimise food miles. This also supports local farmers and ensures fresher ingredients.
Vegetarian or Vegan Menu: If you are a vegan or vegetarian yourself, consider offering a plant-based menu or include more vegetarian and vegan options, which typically have a lower environmental impact than meat-based meals.
Avoid Food Waste: Work with your caterer to plan portions carefully to reduce food waste. If there are leftovers, consider donating them to a local shelter or food bank. Make sure to ask your caterer upfront what would happen to leftover portions, as some venues restrict you from both taking the extra portions, but also from donating them due to wanting to avoid food safety and hygiene issues. If your venue won’t allow this, consider how you can ensure that there is very little waste on the day. I can’t imagine there won’t be guests who would turn down an extra portion of food, if some were available!
10. Sustainable Tableware
Replace single-use items with sustainable alternatives for your table settings.
Compostable Tableware: If you’re having a more casual event, opt for compostable or biodegradable plates, cups, and utensils.
Reusable Options: For a formal wedding, use reusable or rented plates, glasses, and cutlery if you’re having to provide these yourself to avoid single-use plastic and reduce waste.
11. Eco-Friendly Confetti
Traditional confetti is often made of plastic, which is harmful to the environment. Opt for biodegradable or natural alternatives that won’t harm wildlife.
Biodegradable Confetti: Use biodegradable confetti made from dried flower petals, leaves, or rice. Brands like Shropshire Petals offer beautiful, eco-friendly options that look far nicer than traditional plastic confetti!
12. Organic Flowers
Flowers are a big part of wedding decor, but they can come with a high environmental cost due to pesticides and transportation. Choose more sustainable floral options.
Locally Grown Flowers: Source your flowers from local, organic flower farms to reduce the carbon footprint of transporting them. Flowers From the Farm is a network of British growers offering local, seasonal blooms.
Dried Flowers: Consider using dried flowers, which can be kept long after the wedding as a memento or reused in future decor.
Silk Flowers: Although not exactly an “eco-friendly” option as they’re usually highly reliant on plastic and other man-made materials, silk flowers can be re-used over and over for different decorations/purposes and you might even be able to re-sell your decor to another couple, making the silk flowers a more eco-friendly option.
13. Recycled or Upcycled Decor
Decorations are often single-use items, but by choosing sustainable alternatives, you can cut down on waste.
Upcycled Decor: Repurpose vintage or second-hand decor items from charity shops or websites like Etsy. Items such as vases, candle holders, and linens can be given a new life. Charity shops in the UK are overflowing with vases, candle holders, etc. and you can pick them up for a fraction of the cost of buying new.
Rent Your Decor: If you prefer to have your decor done by someone else, look into rental services for everything from furniture to lighting. Companies like The Prop Factory rent out decor items that can add unique touches to your wedding without the waste.
14. Eco-Friendly Transportation
The transportation for your wedding can significantly increase your carbon footprint, especially if guests are travelling from afar.
Carpool or Shuttle: Encourage guests to carpool, or provide a shuttle service to reduce the number of vehicles on the road if you need to transport people from one location to another.
Public Transportation: If you are getting married in a city, encourage guests to use public transportation if you are moving from one venue to the next. This can also result in some fun snaps from the day, with everyone in their wedding attire on the tube!
Electric or Hybrid Vehicles: Hire eco-friendly transportation like electric cars for the wedding party, or encourage guests to use public transport if available.
15. Sustainable Wedding Favours
Wedding favours are a lovely way to thank your guests, but they often end up unused or discarded. Choose favours that are both meaningful and sustainable.
Edible Favours: Give guests locally made edible treats, such as honey, jam, or chocolate, which are more likely to be enjoyed than thrown away.
Seed Packets: Offer seed packets as favours so guests can plant flowers or herbs, leaving a lasting memory of your wedding while supporting biodiversity.
No Favours: It might be controversial, but you can also choose to not hand out wedding favours at all. Most weddings I’ve been to I didn’t even notice the favours and I certainly didn’t attend to receive a wedding favour. My memories from the day with the happy couple were more than enough!
16. Recycle or Donate Leftovers
After the wedding, there’s often leftover decor, food, and other items that can be recycled, donated, or repurposed.
Recycle Decorations: Set up recycling bins at the venue to ensure that paper, glass, and other materials are disposed of responsibly. Check with your venue if they recycle if they’re in charge of clearing up.
Donate Flowers: Instead of letting your flowers go to waste, donate them to a local hospital, care home, or charity where they can bring joy to others. Some venues may even have an arrangement in place to allow you to leave your flowers on site and they can ensure they get to the right people.
Repurpose Decor: Consider keeping some decor items for future parties or gifting them to friends or family members for their own events. You can donate the rest to charity shops and they can resell them or even use them to brighten up their window displays for example, enticing more customers to come in to their shop.
17. Eco-Friendly Honeymoon
Your eco-friendly wedding doesn’t have to end with the reception. Consider a sustainable honeymoon by choosing an eco-conscious destination or activities that promote responsible travel.
Eco-Resorts: Book your honeymoon at an eco-friendly resort that focuses on sustainability, such as The Scarlet Hotel in Cornwall, which is known for its eco-luxury accommodations and environmental efforts.
Mynd Hotels: My fiancé and I got engaged when on holiday in Tenerife earlier this year and we stayed at a resort focused on sustainability. We absolutely loved our stay and the way the hotel operated, so if you are looking for a honeymoon abroad, but still want to focus on sustainability, I cannot recommend the Mynd chain enough!
Final Thoughts
Planning an eco-friendly wedding may require a little extra thought and research, but the impact you make by choosing sustainable options can be significant. By incorporating even a few of these ideas, you can reduce your environmental footprint and inspire your guests to think more sustainably, too. From choosing a green venue to giving back through donation, there are countless ways to make your big day a reflection of your love for each other and the planet.
Start your journey to a sustainable wedding by exploring local vendors, eco-conscious services, and the many wonderful ways you can reduce waste on your special day!
