Eco Chic Bridal Gowns

Almost two years ago, Laura and I did a post about environmentally friendly bridal gowns for Style Me Pretty. (You can read the original post here.) It’s amazing how the eco-chic market has grown since then, with more and more talented designers coming on the scene. Lucky us-- the results are nothing short of gorgeous!

Here's a sampling of the "green" bridal gowns that have caught our eyes lately. First up, Oregon-based designer Sarah Seven:

Photo credits: All images Sarah Seven on Etsy except for top right (Sarah Seven featured on Utterly Engaged)

Nautically Inspired Weddings

Whether your wedding is shipboard or on land, nautically inspired nuptials offer boat loads of charm. We hope this seaworthy inspiration board sends you off into a wonderful weekend-- bon voyage!

First row: navy bridesmaid dress (Sweet Monday Photography), seersucker bridesmaid dress by Thread, hand painted Lanterns (Style Me Pretty), escort card display (Brides.com)

Second row: seersucker ring bearer (Ritzy Bee), table setting (Style Me Pretty), yellow shoes (J. Crew), boutonniere (Brides.com)

Third row: deck chair (Brides.com), invitation suite (brides.com), chairs (Snippet and Ink), bride (Snippet & Ink)

Fourth row: lifesaver (Brides.com), wine, aisle runner and bouquet (Brides.com, tablescape (Snippet and Ink), paddles (Style Me Pretty)

Natalie and Mike {A Sneak Video Peek}!

Take a sneak peek at my wedding from this past Saturday from the fabulous Tom Bowen.
The couple and families were amazing, the decor was breathtaking and the party was rocking! More photos and details to come! Enjoy!

Laura

Ahoy! {Weddings at Sea}

Ships and boats aren’t options in all areas (obviously), but can be creative venues for weddings. If you love the water, exchanging vows on the deck of a beautiful paddlewheel boat or sleek yacht might be your idea of heaven.

Keep in mind that not all your guests will be as sea-worthy as you, though and once the boat has set sail, there’s no getting on or off. If you decide on a shipboard wedding, try to make it shorter than a typical five hour reception to be considerate of guests who might not want to be on the water for so long. Seasickness patches aren’t a bad thing to stock up on, either!

It is crucial with a wedding on a boat to indicate on your invitations exactly what time the boat will depart. Showing up late after the ship has sailed is no fun!



Other details to consider when planning a wedding at sea:

--How many people can realistically fit on the boat. Usually space restrictions on a ship are set because of safety so there is not much wiggle room.

--Catering space--We have had to build catering tents on docks to accommodate large ship weddings! Most boast don't have lots of kitchen space so choose a caterer with experience doing shipboard weddings. You also may have to adjust your ideas to what works on a boat!

--Weather-- This can be a big issue. No one wants to be sailing in a storm and Mother Nature is one thing you can't control. Be sure you can enough inside space on the boat to hold all your guests in case your wedding day doesn't turn out to be sunny. If you do have a super sunny day, you might want to provide sunscreen towelettes for guests so they don't get burned standing on the deck for hours.

Coming up later this week at Bridal Bubbly: creative ideas for nautical weddings!

A New Look!

Welcome to the new and improved Bridal Bubbly! We wanted a fresh look so designer Heather Bianchi stepped in a created something fabulous. Heather also designs gorgeous invitations and paper products (including favor tags, labels and boxes) for weddings. Here are some of her lovely looks.





We'd love to know what you think about our new look! Enjoy!
Laura

Earth Week Inspiration!

wildflowers in glass bottles (weddingchicks.com), invitations (Chewing the Cud),
bridesmaid dress (Nimli), Stephen Russell and Brilliant Earth Rings (Martha
Stewart Weddings), flower girl dress (Whitten), paper flower boutiniere (Martha
Stewart Weddings), wine (Martha Stewart Weddings), bridal gown by Sarah Seven
and eco friendly jewelry (Utterly Engaged), organic cake by Sarah Magid, bridal
shoes (shoes.com), recycled glass votives with 100% soy wax candles (Martha
Stewart Weddings)

Enjoy our Earth Week finale: an inspiration board of everything eco-friendly and organic for weddings! It's been a fun week!

Happy Earth Day {40th Anniversary}

Today is officially the 40th Anniversary of Earth Day! It's pretty cool to think how far things have come, especially for weddings. A decade ago, virtually no one talked about eco-friendly weddings. Even five years ago, green weddings weren't nearly as mainstream as they are today.

So even if you don't plan on having a completely green wedding (or maybe you haven't thought about greening your wedding at all), consider doing just one or two small things that can make a big difference in the environmental impact of your wedding.

Plant trees-- Offset some of the carbon emissions that invariably come from an event by planting trees. You can even use this as a favor. American Forests is a great organization for tree planting. Or give your guests tree saplings from The Green World Project to plant in honor of your wedding or potted herbs (if most guests are local and don't have to schlep a pot through an airport). In honor of Earth Day, we are planting 100 trees through American Forests today!

Potted herbs in buckets by Kelly MacPhee via Snippet & Ink; Herbs in terra cotta pots via Intimate Weddings

Straight-up Offset-- Carbon Fund will help you determine how much to offset for your event. They even have a feature you can put on your wedding website so you can get your guests involved. Even offsetting a little bit can help.

Eat local-- Talk to your caterer about sourcing local food. We do lots of "100-mile" weddings where all the food comes from a 100 mile radius. Sure, there are some things we have to skip, but the food is always fresher and more flavorful if it is in season and isn't being trucked a thousand miles.

Skip one paper product-- Save paper by not having oodles of tags and cards and inserts. Most weddings don't need so many invitation inserts, Simplify and put extra information (like directions and hotel pricing) on your website. Instead of one menu per person, do a couple per table or have one large beautifully written menu displayed. If you have ceremony programs, only print one per couple. We always end up with extra programs at the end of a wedding anyway! If it is an option, choose recycled paper for your printed goods. We love Twisted Limb for fabulous recycled invitations!

And one of our favorite letterpress companies, Smock, has joined forces with the Amazon Conservation Association, to encourage couples to bypass traditional wedding favors at their receptions and go eco instead. Instead of candied almonds, personalized mix CDs or other traditional less-green “keepsakes” for your guests, why not help save the Amazon rainforests (and help slow global warming) instead? For a $5 donation per guest, you can thank your loved ones with a contribution to help protect the Amazon. Couples will receive one beautiful favor card per two guests, sustainably letterpressed on bamboo paper, to display on tables at your reception explaining how your donation has helped create a better livelihood for local communities and to help conserve the biological diversity of the Amazon basin. Smock donated the design and letterpress printing of the favor cards and will gladly personalize these favor cards for free for those couples who have chosen Smock for their letterpress wedding invitations.



These are just a few basic ideas. We'd love to hear what you're doing to make your day more eco-chic! Happy Earth Day!

Laura

Traveling in {Green} Style

Earth Week rolls on and we are rolling right into fun ways to get around on your wedding day without guzzling lots of gas. If your wedding isn't all in one location, chances are you'll need a way to get from one venue to the next.

Instead of using traditional limos (or, heaven forbid, huge stretch Hummers), why not try Enviroride? Their fleet consists of Toyota Camry Hybrids, Toyota Highlander Hybrids and "Blue Tec" Mercedes. All of the cars are equipped with GPS and real time connection with dispatchers to help with any re-routing (and if you've ever tried to locate a late limo, you know how crucial that is).



If you want to make even less of an environmental impact, check out the three pedicab operators in D.C. Capitol Pedicabs, DC Pedicab and National Pedicab all provide bike-driven transportation around the city. It may take a while to move all of your guests this way but it's the perfect way for a couple to make their getaway! Happy riding!

Laura

Eco Umbrellas

Our fun Earth Week series on eco-friendly wedding ideas continues! Since we are in April, the month of April showers, it's fitting to talk about stylish umbrellas. We've used umbrellas to shade form sun, protect from rain and just to look cute! Now there's a new, eco-friendly option for wedding umbrellas for the bride who wants to be as green as possible. The biodegradable BRELLI is sustainably made from bamboo, a renewable resource, and features a unique, patented, biodegradable PVC clear canopy. This canopy offers vision, superior protection from the elements, and is a bright and brilliant evolutionary leap forward from the dark and damp alternative. It is the ultimate high-fashion accessory that is still green.

Even in landfill environments, a discarded BRELLI will completely biodegrade in less than five years... this is a tiny fraction of the time it takes for a conventional umbrella to biodegrade. BRELLIs are also made from materials that, during their biodegradation process, release only harmless gases. The gas released by each discarded BRELLI in a conditional landfill can be harvested to generate enough electricity to recoup more than 90% of the energy that was used to create it. Cool, huh? But if that doesn't convince you, just check out how fab they look!

Happy Earth Week!

April 22nd is Earth Day so here at Bridal Bubbly we're going to be celebrating all week long! We love eco-friendly wedding ideas so all week we'll be highlighting our favorite green wedding finds.

One of the age-old wedding questions is what to throw as you're leaving the ceremony or reception. Most places don't allow rice or confetti and lots of historic sites around here have nixed sparklers so that leaves you with not much (especially if you don't like the idea of bubbles). And if you're trying to limit your waste (you hate the idea of plastic bubble containers getting tossed into a landfill), things get really tough.



We were in one such predicament with an upcoming wedding until we discovered eco-friendly confetti that is biodegradable and dissolves upon contact with water plus paper cones made out of seed paper that can be planted after the wedding!

We love this eco-friendly (and lovely) idea! Not only can your guests shower you with confetti (great for photos) but they can then take the cones home and plant them in their garden. Love it!