7 Steps to Planning your Go Green Wedding

How you can throw an eco-chic wedding event:

1. Think about transportation. Does it make sense to have several members of the wedding party ride together in a limousine, or does it make more sense to have people car pool in their own cars? It all depends on your situation.

2. Use recycled paper, such as hemp or bamboo, to design/create your own wedding invitations. Keep your wedding invitation as simple as possible and try to use front and back of the card to fill up all the necessary information. Electronic mailings are the most earth friendly way when it comes to contacting your guests. This is also a great way to cut costs and save money on your wedding!

3. Send your guests home with a plant or tree seedling as a party favor.
Planting a tree that will grow and symbolize your positive contribution to
your community for your and your children's lifetimes is a lovely way to start
your lives together.

4. Give the gift of an experience, instead of a thing. Try a gift certificate for a restaurant (that serves organic food, maybe?) or a pass to national parks (if they like hiking) or a museum pass (if they’re into art) or cooking classes.

5. There are many things you can do to “green-up” your wedding cake. You may bake your own cake by asking for help from your friends or relatives. If none of your friends or relatives are available to help, you can consider cupcakes and use biodegradable cupcake liners. Choose the edible decorations so that they won’t end up in the garbage. This will also save you tons of money instead of ordering a cake from a bakery and you won’t have as much wastage with cupcakes.

6. Organic flowers can be more expensive, but you can cut costs by designing your floral arrangements based on local, seasonal availability, or by filling out you centerpieces with greenery and herbs.

7. Creating the menu for the reception based on abundant, seasonal options, such as fruit in the summer or root vegetables in the winter, also is the way to save if you are using product from smaller, organic farms that are typically a little more expensive. It's a timely and costly process for farms to become certified organic, which contributes to the added expense on our end, but it's such a growing trend that there is increased availability for organic products of all kinds, literally from soup to nuts.