More couples are choosing 'green' weddings
Author: Bree Steffen, San Diego
According to The Knot 2021 Sustainability Survey, one of the top trends of how couples are incorporating sustainability into their weddings is through decor. Fifty percent of couples upcycled items or bought secondhand decor, meanwhile 39% sought eco-friendly flowers and decor. Other ways couples have gone green include reducing food waste (46%), avoiding throwaway paper products (45%), sourcing food locally (37%), selecting eco-friendly venue locations (23%), and registering for eco-friendly gifts (17%). Breah Anderson is the CEO at Green Field Paper Company, which has an eco-friendly and sustainable wedding invitation line. All of their paper is tree free, reinventing the tradition of creating fine paper without cutting down trees. They use 100% recycled materials like cotton and hemp and even add wild flower seeds to their paper so it can be planted back into the ground. Anderson said she’s seen many people change their buying patterns to include more sustainable options. Anderson inspects every piece of paper by hand, putting any with flaws back into the paper process to re-make it. She hopes other couples and companies are inspired to make better choices, while still getting what they want. “It’s a great time to be sustainable and people are really looking outside the box,” she said. “People don’t care if they have to pay more money to have a really high-quality, handmade item that’s also sustainable.”