LOCATION – EXTRAVAGANT & ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY
Ever thought about the energy consumption of the venue in which you celebrate your wedding? Have you already researched whether there exist solar panels on the roof? Or thought about the water consumption in place? Discuss with the owner of the location whether they reduce and compensate their carbon emissions and what they do for the well-being of their employers. If you need orientation: Our ChargeHolidays Sustainability Check is optimized for hotellerie, however the criteria can also be a helpful guide for gastronomy and venues.
Meat and dairy accounts for 14.5% of all manmade greenhouse gas emissions.
FOOD – DELICIOUS AND WITHOUT A PANG OF CONSCIOUS
What is a great wedding without an unforgettable gourmet experience? When it comes to the sustainability of food, a thick book is not enough to tell the whole background. Despite this high complexity, there are some basic rules which can be followed:
Reduce food waste. Roughly one third of the food produced for human consumption is lost every year. This weighs an unimaginable 1.3 bio. tons. For reducing food waste, tell your guests to bring storage boxes in order to take leftovers with them back home. You can also approach the restaurant of your choice and ask whether they are already collaborating with initiatives like foodsharing or Too good to go, which are both aiming a food waste free nutrition industry. That way ingredients as well as ready cooked dishes are used what they are created for: being eaten and not seeing the trash back from its insight.
Use regional, seasonal and biological products: Products from different regions all over the world must have travelled long distances, mainly by ship or plane what both emits a lot of carbon dioxide and other relevant climate gases. Food which has been harvested months ago needs to be stored to maintain its shape and taste. This cooling and storing is highly energy-consuming, thus creating a negative impact for the environment. The more regional and seasonal the food, the better it is for nature.
Keep the dish vegan or vegetarian. Besides saving animal lives when abstaining from animal products, you also save significant amounts of water, CO2-emissions and land area. We recommend that you play around with your taste and the one of your guests, creating some creative menu. We are sure that the “chef de la cuisine” of the restaurant of your choice will be open-minded to discuss the existing options for a healthy and delicious eco-friendly dish.
PRESENTS – DECIDE WHAT YOU NEED AND WANT FOR THE FUTURE
When marrying you may already have something in mind what is important for the next stage of life. Whatever item you suggest your guests to bring, you can tell them criteria which matter. For instance, it can be important to have microplastic free articles, reusable items, or you want to exclude products from companies being involved in child labor or civil wars. In the ChargeHorizons Shop for instance you can find products which meet those criteria. Above, you can think whether immaterial goods are also a nice present which may have less harmful effects for the environment. Getting a massage, meeting together for a hike, visiting a vegan cooking event,… all those activities can be nice presents as well. Independent of your flavor and interests: try to avoid that your guests bring along unnecessary presents which may directly land in the bin.
HONEYMOON – COMBINE ADVENTURES WITH ROMANTIC RELAXATION
Honeymoon is the time for bringing it all together: sustainable travel within your life and on the globe.
Firstly, it is important to decide where to go. If you are not sure or just cannot agree with your partner, ChargeHorizons offers a gamified version in order to find out about your inner dreams. Like that, you can agree on a suiting destination without being biased by recommendations and stereotypical thinking.
The distance to the destination plays an important role. We recommend to appreciate slow travel during your honeymoon and avoid hectical flights. Our partner terran provides you with useful tips, ideas and insights from personal experiences how to pass long distances with a small CO2-footprint. If you decide to take a petrol car or the plane: consider supporting a trustworthy project for offsetting the respective emissions, for instance our cooperation partner myclimate.
Packing minimalistic is another way how you can not only help the health of your back but also contribute to a more sustainable environment. With a light luggage you save CO2-emissions during the transportation and make it easier for you to travel with CO2-neutral means, such as tramways or bikes instead of using a car with all the luggage. Think carefully about the essentials you need, try to cooperate with others, so that you do not have to double items which you can share and rent. What a great opportunity to directly start into the married life by sharing!
As always, also during your travel experience it is great to follow a sustainable friendly lifestyle. One important aspect which you can tackle is food. Psychologically you are more open to trying out new habits, tastes and senses when you are not following your daily routine. Take the chance and combine your trip with the challenge of eating vegan, 100% local or biological. This little task will add a nice feature to your journey with you interacting as food detective along the way. You can even try to compete against your freshly baked husband or wife and challenge who finds the more tasty sustainable friendly food and who creates the better dishes in the kitchen of the rent apartment.
As the honeymoon trip shall be unforgettable, plan some activities worth to remember your whole life. Be careful that those do not harm the local culture and nature. Plan a small tour guided by a native and organized by an organization which uses the ticket money to preserve the reserves and parcs for a long time instead of going for a classical CO2-insentive Safari. There are many offers in place which can serve countries all over the world to keep their charm of authentic tourism spots. Following some of these principles, you are going to start your partnership with a great travel experience without a pang of conscious.
Since this is the last part of our triology about sustainable wedding. I hope that you could take several inspirations from it. The content shall not limit or restrict you but instead help you having fun while organizing and planning your wedding and everything connected to it in an enjoyful way. We are looking forward to receiving all your nice stories about your wedding experiences!
Lilith Diringer
Our CEO Lilith is fascinated how many aspects can be designed in a sustainable way when getting married. She is eager to discover new sustainability hacks every day and likes to share her research and experience with you.