We had lovely food and drinks and over 50 people came out. It was a great way to have all of our friends and family mingle together at one big event. We had some of the food catered by Market Restaurant on Marriott Road and the rest was courtesy Banks-Graaff Culinary Team. We got some great feed-back on the venue as well which is always a pleasure to hear because it's one of our favorite spots in Durban.
Some of the things that we did that made this party as green as possible were:
1. Instead of using paper or styrofoam plates which can only be used once and occupy a huge amount of land fill space we hired extra plates, glasses, and cutlery that can be used over and over again. The napkins/serviettes were also biodegradable.
2. We had the event in the evening so the weather would be more mild and easier to have outside thereby using less electricity for climate control, and used low impact lighting and candles, etc.
3. All of the serving dishes were ceramic and re-useable and the plastic containers that I did use to transport some of the food was recycled and re-purposed from other food I've purchased. Those take-out containers go a long way!
4. We chose a venue with a central location thereby making it easy for people from every direction to get there and it was also close to where all the food and beverage was coming from thereby reducing the amount of petrol used to put the event on.
5. The food we purchased was from a very whole starting point: fresh fruit, fresh vegetables, uncooked and unprocessed to keep more nutrients in them and all made with fresh organic herbs, of course the cooked food was cooked correctly, but we did not use any processed food, even the pesto was completely fresh and from a local vendor. The pumpkin bake I made was also a hit which doesn't even use a container, you bake a pumpkin, throw stuff into it and bake it some more! (This was a party favorite I must say.)
6. The decorations were simple, carved hearts and raffia which will be our christmas ornaments and gift wrapping materials. Getting multi-purpose and re-useable decorations is key in having a green event.
7. The centerpieces I purchased from the on-site nursery (Touchwood Nursery) so no delivery needed and had him plant them in re-used pewter mugs that I got from local antique shops (after Simon drilled a hole in the bottom for water routing). Instead of having cut flowers I had useful plants potted in a decorative way. The pewter adds to the mineral content of your plants and helps keep the indoor plants even more healthy. I had herbs such as coriander, sweet basil and parsley planted in them and they look stunning. Not to mention the succulents which use minimal water to sustain were planted in recycled containers.
8. Most importantly, the entire event was VEGETARIAN. We had minimal left overs and people raved about the food. Eating less meat is the easiest way to reduce your carbon footprint and probably one of the healthiest changes you can do for yourself. Simply having a vegetarian meal at least once a week will do wonders for your heart health, cholesterol levels, immune system, and more.
9. Fundamentally, we had the event locally in Durban instead of Cape Town to help reduce the amount of travel needed for those that live in Durban. Not to mention, this helps out economically as well because it enables our Durban friends to participate in the wedding without having to come all the way to Cape Town and helps local businesses' sustainability.
10. We did not send out any paper invitations, instead we invited people via email, Facebook, and even a phone call which meant no paper or petrol used to produce the paper or get the invitation via mail to your door. This is also how the wedding invitations will be done as well.
Thank you to all that brought some lovely gifts and food and wine! We are so lucky to have such great friends and family to celebrate this exciting time in our life!
More to come on the wedding itself, much progress has been made and things are getting finalized, yay!
