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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Wednesday, July 18, 2007

Trendy green weddings in Hawaii, elsewhere

Advertiser Staff Reports and News Services

Hawaii news photo - The Honolulu Advertiser

Maureen Ferguson and Bill Lewis, who married at The Kahala in May, carpooled guests in a rented trolley to save fuel. Wedding trends now focus on having a "green" event.

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GO GREEN

Hawai'i wedding planners suggest ways to go green for a local ceremony:

  • Pick a vintage or organic-material dress and vintage ring. Use cocktail dresses for the bridesmaids that can be used more than once.

  • Use fans or local flowers for the bouquet, and recycle the bouquets as head table centerpieces.

  • Choose edible fruit or nonperishable, recyclable centerpieces and decorations.

  • At the reception, have water service only upon request. Stick with china and glass, no plastic.

  • Recycle bar bottles and cans.

  • Save a few trees by setting up an invitation Web site, suggests Dianna Shitanishi. Send save-the-date cards (recycled paper, please) noting that updates will be posted on the site. You can even use e-mail for RSVPs.

  • Instead of favors, make a donation to an environmental charity. Or figure out the carbon footprint (online, you can find a calculator at www.drivinggreen.com) left by travelers attending your wedding and offset it with a donation to a green cause.

  • Print only one menu per table.

  • Offer leftover food to Aloha Harvest (www.alohaharvest.org; 537- 6945) to feed the homeless.

    LEARN MORE

  • www.greenweddings.net: Links to green bridal goods and services.

  • www.greatgreenwedding.com: Links to green providers (including Hawai'i honeymoon and floral ideas) and discussion groups.

  • www.brides.com/green: Eco-wedding guide for all states, including Hawai'i, though a bit out of date (it suggests a visit to the late Don Ho's now-dark Waikiki show.

  • www.ecochicweddings.com: Ideas from the author of the book of the same name.

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    Love, honor and obey: That was then. Reduce, reuse and recycle: This is now. Brides, grooms and the $73 billion wedding industry that caters to them are paying more attention to the environmental implications of their choices.

    Take Maureen Ferguson of Hermosa Beach, Calif., who married Bill Lewis at The Kahala last May. For their wedding, they eschewed using any plastic; and to keep from wasting fuel, rented a trolley to transport guests from the wedding to the reception.

    And they found ways to maximize the romantic island setting.

    "I really felt strongly that the ceremony site was so beautiful, we shouldn't cut flowers just because," said the bride, an executive with Virgin Entertainment Group, who used seashells harvested responsibly for decorations. "We let nature do its thing. Also, I didn't want to mask the beauty of the wedding site."

    The bride incorporated touches from the planning process on, such as recycled-paper save-the-date cards, using telephone and e-mail for RSVPs and digital photos.

    "The wedding became green organically — no pun intended," she said. "... It was very painless. Vendors nowadays are in tune with the eco-friendly and green movement, so there are a lot more options out there than five years ago. Whether it's trendy or the right thing to do, it makes it easy to have a choice."

    The trend was barely on the cultural radar screen a couple of years ago, but like the Lewises, more couples concerned about global warming are scaling back and thinking green as they plan wedding venues, menus, flowers and transportation, helped by a multiplying array of Web sites, stores and catalogs.

    Twenty-something brides blog about dumping mailed response cards for e-mail RSVPs. Some choose biodegradable Ecofetti. Invitations are being printed with soy ink on paper made of 100 percent post-consumer waste.

    In Hawai'i, wedding planners have seen a shift.

    "The younger generation are more environmentally and socially conscious," said wedding planner Dianna Shitanishi, owner of Hawaii Weddings and Events, who as chapter president of the National Association of Catering Executives is currently at a conference in Houston where many members of the hospitality industry are excited about green efforts.

    The trend is picking up steam. In its 2007 February/March issue, Brides magazine carried its first major article detailing how to have a green wedding. (Examples: Serve soup in cucumber cups, leaving no bowls to wash; choose an organic wedding cake carried in on a bamboo platter.)

    "Couples are thinking of their future families and how they can do something kind for the planet with this occasion," says Millie Martini Bratten, editor in chief. The new thinking, she says, is "looking at the wedding as a way to do something really beautiful but not waste."

    According to a survey in 2006 by Condé Nast, Brides publisher, there are 2.3 million American weddings each year, with an average cost of $27,852.

    When the magazine staged a quick survey on its Web site, www.brides.com, 60 percent of respondents said the environment was important in planning their wedding; 33 percent said they were planning to have a green wedding.

    Wedding planners and experts here say it's a natural undercurrent in Hawai'i, where residents automatically choose to care for the 'aina.

    "A lot more vendors are offering green and social-conscious choices," said Tanna Dang, owner of the Wedding Cafe, a wedding resource center based in Manoa, adding that conflict-free diamonds are a big buzz item among brides.

    "Hawai'i is a very ecologically friendly place anyway. ... It's great they're thinking along those lines."

    Advertiser staff writer Mary Kaye Ritz contributed Hawai'i information to this report by Jura Koncius of The Washington Post.