…And not just take up space in newlyweds home.
I have to confess I love weddings, it is so nice to watch two people commit to each other. My husband and I got married twice, once in his country, once in my country. Both times it was a wedding in nature and I have the best memories for both of our weddings. We kept both ceremonies small, simple, and eco-friendly. I would do it all over again!
Decades ago, when people got married, most of them were going to move together after the wedding. Therefore, they needed to furnish their new home. So the presents newlyweds usually got where home appliances, bedding, decorations, and other items to furnish the house.
Nowadays, most couples move in before they get married, and so usually they already own most of the stuff they need. And that is why it is sometimes even more difficult now to find the perfect gift. Certainly, wedding registries can help us to pick something the couple actually needs or wants. But the gifts I have in mind do not appear in any of the registries that I know of.
Eco-friendly wedding gifts
If you are looking for a gift for an eco-friendly couple or a couple who are thinking of lowering their impact on the planet, you might not find anything on the registry, if they even have one. I would like to propose a few gifts, that are not only eco-friendly because of the materials they are made of. Mostly they are eco-friendly because they inspire future action and improvement. So there won’t be a reclaimed wood statue, or smart reusable water bottle, or a ceramic pot on this list. The presents I will list here might be considered unusual at least.
To get to this list, the items must be eco-friendly both because of the process and materials of how it was made. Also, they will actually improve on the newlyweds’ eco-lifestyle. These eco-friendly wedding gifts must help them decrease their impact on the environment, help them increase their eco-friendly actions. These items won’t just add to the clutter of all the items the couple already owns.
I am not using any affiliate links, everything I recommend is because I like it and think it is useful. Feel free to search for different options in the same products category.
Contents
- Vermicomposter
- Kitchen Compost Bin
- Homebiogas
- Vertical garden
- All-in-one Zero-waste Box™
- Hire a vegan chef for a few dinners at home
- Luxury loose leaves tea set
Vermicomposter / worm bin
If you have read some of my previous articles, you might start getting the idea, that I am a big worm composting fan. You are right! I think worm bin composting is one of the best ways to reduce your trash. Food waste usually constitutes more than 50% of our trash and you can easily get rid of it, in the comfort of your home, without sending it to the landfill. This way you are preventing the production of greenhouse gases in the landfill. It has the added benefit of creating nutrient-rich soil that will keep your house plants or your garden happy.
Depending on the newlyweds housing situation, and on the size of their family, you can get them a different size or shape worm bin for their garden, balcony, or even for inside the apartment. After setting up the worm bin, they will be able to put most of their food waste in the bin.
As an inspiration, look at this custom made artisan wooden worm bin on Etsy!
To learn more about how to start and take care of the worm bin, read my following article. Here I explain everything from start to end: setting up, feeding, harvesting, and even troubleshooting the worm bin.
Kitchen Compost Bin
If the happy couple already has a worm bin, or you know someone else is already giving it to them as an eco-friendly wedding gift, you can give them an important accessory for worm composting.
In order to collect the food waste, they will need a bin to collect the waste for several days. From my personal experience, it is best, if the bin has a lid, to prevent having fruit flies around. Some bins even come with a charcoal filter that prevents any undesired smells. For inspiration look at this stylish bin at Amazon!
Homebiogas
If the happy couple lives in a house with a yard, you could give them a big gift, with an even greater impact. You could form a group of people, everyone pitches in to give them Homebiogas, or another food digester, together.
Homebiogas is a device that converts your food waste into clean energy! After assembling Homebiogas in the yard, the happy couple can put ALL the food waste into the digester. This includes food that is not recommended in compost or worm bins like oils, meat, and dairy, and others.
The bacteria in the digester will break the food waste down, and gas will be created and stored in the gas storage tank. This gas is later used to cook on. Their food waste will create clean cooking energy for their home. Moreover, they will also get a natural fertilizer for their plants or garden!
Vertical garden
To stay in the yard/garden or balcony for a while longer, I would recommend giving the newlyweds something to facilitate their gardening. If they haven’t started a vegetable garden yet, help them start now.
In general, with gardens, it is much better to start slow. If you take very good care of a small garden, you will have a better yield than if you take bad care of a bigger garden. With a smaller garden, there is a smaller chance to get overwhelmed and more chance to stick to it. Help them fall in love with gardening and gradually add more and more.
Having a garden has many ecological benefits. Each tomato they will grow doesn’t need to be packaged, transported, stored, and transported again to get to their house. Moreover, they will probably not use chemical fertilizers and pesticides that degrade soil quality. Additionally, they will improve air quality in their environment by adding any plant.
Pick a nice stylish vertical garden made of wood like this one on Etsy. Alternatively, if they have a big garden, you can buy them handmade artisan wooden raised bed like this one! Add some seeds or tools, and they are good to go!
All-in-one Zero-waste Box™ from Terracycle
Terracycle offers help recycling the more unusual, or harder to recycle materials. They receive the materials you don’t know what to do with them, but you don’t want to send them to the landfill. Terracycle will send the happy couple a box that they can start filling with all the allowed materials.
For All in one Box, they will be able to put in any waste including but not limited to: Art Supplies, Books & Magazines, E-Waste, Home Cleaning Accessories, Fabrics, and Clothing, Pet Products (non-food), Plastic Cards, Shipping Materials, Storage Media, Plastic and Paper Packaging, Kitchen Gear, Filters (air/water), Coffee Capsules and Coffee Bags, Party Supplies and Dining Disposables and others.
When the box is full, They will ship it back to Terracycle. Terracycle will process and recycle everything they put in. After the first box, the happy couple could decide to keep at it and order another box.
Hire a vegan chef for a few dinners at home
From the garden, let’s move to the kitchen. Wedding planning is exhausting, the newlyweds might appreciate not having to cook for a few nights. Hire a vegan chef that will go to their house and prepare them a nice dinner. Splurge and treat them with a few dinners, or even batch cooking for the whole week for them.
And why vegan? As I mention in my article about how to make your kitchen more eco-friendly,
I believe that aminal farming is one of the contributing factors to climate change, pollution, unequal resource distribution, soil damage, and many other adverse effects. The dairy and meat industries produce the most pollution (greenhouse gas emissions, water pollution) from all the industries, even more than all the transportation together. Apart from pollution, there are many other problems caused by animal farming. According to The Guardian, Animal farms take up 83% of farmland, producing only 18% of calories.
https://www.echo-eco.com/how-can-i-make-eco-friendly-kitchen/
Adding more vegan or vegetarian meals doesn’t harm anyone, and it can help the environment. Moreover, balanced vegetarian and vegan diets are very healthy. Learning new ways of cooking, learning about using more plant-based ingredients can widen their usual ways of cooking. They may even find new favorite recipes!
Luxury loose leaves tea set
Another great option to spice up their kitchen while inspiring an eco-friendly action is to find them a nice set of teapot, with tea infuser and a variety of loose leaf teas. This way the newlyweds can start brewing their own tea at home and stop using tea bags, that usually just end up in the trash and consequently in the landfill.
Assemble a nice set with a teapot of your choice with a built-in, or removable infusor, something similar to this one on Etsy, and a set of loose teas to try different flavors like this one also on Etsy.
Starting a newly wedded life can be a great moment to add more conscious actions in the life of the bride and the groom. They might be willing to try new things and looking for ways to improve their life. Give them a chance to do that with a well picked eco-friendly wedding gift. Who really needs another set of recycled glasses, although beautiful, when they already have a fully furnished home?
I am not using any affiliate links, everything I recommend is because I like it and think it is useful. Feel free to search for different options in the same products category.
