Our (Almost) Zero Waste Wedding, Part 1: The Ceremony

We got hitched! I loved every minute of it and if it was up to me, we would get remarried every year. There are a lot of guides out there on how to have a Zero Waste wedding but I thought I would share my experience of planning an almost Zero Waste wedding as every wedding is different.

Our wedding was divided up into two parts: the Ceremony and the Reception (or really, you can just call it what is truly is, a really fun party). This post is focusing on our ceremony.

It was important to Chuck and me to have a very intimate ceremony so we opted for a civil ceremony at a city hall. After researching city halls in Los Angeles, Orange County, Santa Barbara and San Francisco, we decided to have our ceremony in San Francisco. The city hall there is unbeatable (it's called the People's Palace for a reason!), Chuck and I both love the city and have emotional ties to it, and all of my family members attending would be coming from the north so with Chuck's parents and the two of us coming from the south, it was an almost central spot.

Having never been married before, I had no idea what I was doing so I did some research beforehand and found this excellent blog post on how to get married at San Francisco City Hall. The wedding industry, like almost all industries today, has gotten so out of hand and commercialized that it's basically unaffordable for most unless you get really creative or have help. If this is your situation, a city hall wedding is the perfect choice for both cost reasons and waste reasons. Our marriage license was $104.00 and the ceremony was $83.00. The photographer was $550.00 (plus tip!). So, depending on what you wear, you can get married for less than $1000.00, which is manageable.

While Chuck rented his suit (perfectly Zero Waste!), I became a woman obsessed with wedding dresses. Yes, I became the thing that I never thought would be possible: an Eco-Bridezilla. I stalked countless sites and asked myself a lot of questions. Which is the best route to go? Should I get something new and sustainably made that I would "wear" again? Something like this gorgeous white silk number from Christy Dawn or any of the selections available in Reformation's bridal collection (the Hollyhock Dress is a personal favorite). Should I rent something? Or should I buy something used?

All the rental sites I found were pretty worthless - their stock did not interest me and the rental prices were outrageous in my opinion. When we decided to have the ceremony at the San Francisco City Hall and I saw that gorgeous grand staircase, I knew I wanted something dramatic to match them, so something new, yet sensible, simple, and sustainable, wasn't the best option. So I went the secondhand route.

I'm so glad that I did. I scoured Craigslist, Poshmark, eBay, and OfferUp. I was astounded by firstly how many used wedding dresses there are in the world, and then secondly how most of the blurbs accompanying the dress went something like, "Wedding dress purchased for $6000.00 and worn once for five hours blah blah blah..." It all seemed so wasteful - a waste of money, and a waste of resources. Some of the dresses were clearly from the 1980s or early 90s so that means that the dress sat in a box in a closet somewhere taking up space for all those years. I knew that I didn't want to spend more than $200.00 on shoes and a dress so with those parameters in mind, I set out to find my dream dress.

And I easily did. I found it for $120.00 on OfferUp and after trying it on in a Mimi's Restaurant bathroom in Anaheim around the corner from Disneyland, I had my perfect dress. I searched around again and found a used puffy petticoat for $21.00 in total (this one had to be shipped) to go underneath. With my leftover money, I bought a simple, white dress for the reception off of eBay for $55.00. Later, in 2021, I resold my wedding dress and petticoat for almost the amount I paid for them myself (I ended up spending $26.00 total for the combo- not too shabby!). I love the idea that this wedding dress will live on and on.

I decided to wear shoes I already owned for a few reasons. With the dress I bought for the ceremony, my shoes weren't really going to be visible so why blow a pile of money on some lame bedazzled, satiny high heels that I would never wear again? I also knew that I would be standing a lot so I wanted to make sure that my shoes were comfortable so I wouldn't get grumpy. Then with the dress I bought for the reception, I had a pair of shoes in mind that I already owned that I thought would work. Weddings are so expensive and I wanted to be as practical as possible where I could so I could be justifiably impractical on other matters.

On the recommendation of our photographer, I got my hair and make-up done by a woman named Adelina. The photographer has a relationship with Adelina so the session was at a discount. I looked around for other hair and make-up artists in San Francisco but I couldn't find someone who was entirely Zero Waste and used ethical, organic make-up. It was important to me to have a professional do my hair and make-up because I'm terrible at it so I decided to book with Adelina. She was extremely professional and I really appreciated the work she did. She was a joy to work with. Here was an opportunity though, to be more Zero Waste as I could have purchased (or brought) my own certified ethical, organic make-up in reusable containers and applied it myself. I could have attempted to do my own hair using the few organic hair products that I already own. I made a choice, though, and I'm really grateful to Adelina for the work that she did.

The cut-flower industry is rife with problems ranging from pesticides, child labor, and water contamination (among others). Read more about the issues here and here. As a wedding gift, I asked my mother to make my bouquet.When I was growing up, my parents owned and operated a dried flower business so this woman is no stranger to floral arrangements. I asked her to use flowers from farmer's market vendors and to create the bouquet without plastic. It was no easy task but she took it in stride. It became a really fun project to work on with her, she would give me updates and send me pictures of flowers that the vendors had during various weeks. Well, it was fun for me! I think it was a bit stressful for her.

Due to my requests, she learned that the floral industry uses plastic foam in the center of bouquets that have a cascading effect but the industry used to use plain old chicken wire back in the day. Taking twine and chicken wire, she constructed my very elaborate bouquet. My mother asked about the ribbon and said she could only find ribbon made out of polyester but I said I would reuse or upcycle it so not worry.

She did buy one bouquet of Rainforest Alliance certified yellow roses as she couldn't find any vendors at the farmer's market with them (it was October so they weren't in season). This added one plastic bag to our final trash count along with the flower packets and the plastic bandaids I had to use because I forgot my bamboo ones.

I took the bouquet back home after the ceremony and decorated the house with the flowers. I composted them and the twine after they wilted.

After the ceremony, we took everyone out to dinner in a restaurant to celebrate. If you're on a budget, there are a lot of options! Thai is always a great choice as it can easily be modified to suit just about anyone's dietary restrictions and it's affordable. Lebanese and Indian food are also wonderful options for these same reasons. Look for places with corkage fees so you can bring your own bottles of wine to save on money. If you're getting married in San Francisco and are looking for ideas, I found this great post with some recommendation for restaurants. It's important to keep in mind that you're getting married during the daytime if you are having a city hall wedding so look for a restaurant that is open during the day if you're wanting to celebrate immediately after the ceremony. We settled on Epic Steak because of the view and also the menu had enough options that everyone in our party with all of their eclectic tastes could find something. The restaurant also sources its organic produce locally, has sustainable seafood and pasture raised meats.