Your wedding day should be a celebration of love – not just between you and your partner, but also between you and the world around you. After planning hundreds of weddings across India and internationally over the past decade, we have witnessed a beautiful shift toward sustainable celebrations that honors the environment as much as the day.
Gone are the days when eco-friendly meant compromising on the vibe. Today’s environmentally conscious couples are discovering that eco-friendly wedding decor often looks more meaningful and stunning than traditional ones. In this blog, we share the top 11 sustainable wedding decor hacks that we regularly use for our clients to keep our planet in mind while celebrating lavishly!
Instead of cut flowers that wilt within days, we have used potted plants as table centerpieces at one of our couple’s destination wedding in Goa. It probably wouldn’t do justice in saying ‘fabulous’ but it did turn out beyond our vision! Terracotta pots filled with herbs like basil, rosemary, or mint create aromatic displays that guests can take home – so they are definitely a win-win! They can keep these as wedding favors to remember your celebration long after it ends.
For an eco-friendly destination wedding in Rajasthan, we have used small potted succulents too that loved the desert climate. But at the same time, they looked absolutely magical against the golden sand dunes – a perfect location-appropriate setup!
If you have been following Vogue weddings for long, you have probably already seen fruit and vegetable arrangements used as elegant centerpieces. Pomegranates, oranges, and seasonal gourds create rich textures and colors, especially beautiful for autumn weddings. After the ceremony, these can be donated to local communities or composted, ensuring nothing goes to waste.
We firmly believe – draping can transform any venue in a matter of hours, and if you follow any of the top wedding decorators in India, you will see they use this formula in all of their weddings! But synthetic fabrics often end up in landfills. Cotton khadi, handwoven silk, or vintage saris create stunning backdrops while also supporting local artisans. Hence, this is a small shift we have started making over the past few years and we have never been prouder of the impact it has on local artisans and nature too.
We once worked with a couple who used their grandmothers’ old saris to create their ceremony arches – the emotional impact was incredible! Each piece carried generations of love. Muslin and organic cotton work beautifully for outdoor ceremonies. Not only that, they photograph gorgeously in natural light and can be repurposed into home decor, baby clothes, or donated to other couples starting their journey too.
Solar-powered string lights have revolutionized eco-friendly outdoor wedding lighting. They charge during the day and give you that fairyland ambiance as the sun sets, completely eliminating the need for generators or extensive electrical setups. For beach weddings in Goa, these are our top choice of all times. We have lost count of how many times we have used these for our clients. We usually combine solar lights with glass lanterns filled with sand and shells – needless to say, the effect was absolutely breathtaking and the couples loved it so much they wanted to put them in their home later!
Candles remain timeless. But it is best to choose soy or beeswax in glass containers that guests can reuse. Mason jars, vintage teacups, or even coconut shells create unique candle holders. One couple we worked with collected glass bottles throughout their engagement and turned them into hanging lanterns for their garden wedding in Malaysia.
When you do choose fresh flowers, think locally and seasonally. Marigolds, jasmine, and roses are abundant across India and require minimal transportation. Work with local flower markets to source blooms that would otherwise be discarded – many vendors are happy to offer day-old flowers at reduced prices. Here’s what most couples don’t know – most top wedding decorators in India (like TWS!) have a secret partnership with flower vendors in different cities who save us the most gorgeous blooms that are just one day past their “prime” selling time. These flowers are absolutely stunning but cost 60% less than fresh ones, and honestly, we source such that no guest can ever notice the difference!
For an eco-friendly wedding in Udaipur, we actually did this for white roses with a twist. After the ceremony, we collected all those petals and taught the couple’s families how to make rose water and potpourri – three months later, their home still smelled like their wedding day!
Create seed paper from flower petals after the ceremony. Your guests can plant these biodegradable papers to grow wildflowers, extending your wedding’s beauty into their own gardens. This idea particularly resonates perfectly with couples going for destination weddings in India, as it gives guests a tangible memory to take home.
Forget plastic signage that screams “disposable.” Wooden signage painted with natural, plant-based paints creates the perfect rustic charm without the environmental guilt. Bamboo installations work beautifully for outdoor ceremonies – bamboo grows rapidly and can be repurposed into furniture or garden structures afterward. Beach weddings in India give such incredible opportunities to collect and use driftwood from the shoreline that have been naturally seasoned by the sea.
We work with verified eco-friendly wedding vendors in India to ensure all your decor items are repurposed or utilized later and do not end up in landfills! For example, we love to donate our decor bamboo to local schools, farms, and homes where they become garden trellises for vegetable patches.
Paper decorations made from recycled materials add whimsy without waste. Book pages, old maps, or sheet music can become stunning garlands, especially meaningful for couples who share these interests. Over a decade-long operation, we have created ceremony backdrops entirely from recycled paper flowers that looked so realistic, guests couldn’t believe they weren’t fresh blooms.
For a winter wedding in Delhi, we used pages from old poetry books to create paper roses in varying sizes. From a distance, guests thought they were real cream-colored roses, but up close, you could read beautiful verses about love on each petal. The couple later framed some of these flowers for their home, and every anniversary, they read the poems together.
Mismatched vintage china creates more visual interest than uniform place settings. We spend weeks before each wedding hunting through local antique markets, estate sales, and even asking family members to contribute pieces that match the couple’s color story. Imagine your dinner table lined with plates from the British colonial times – each plate tells a story and becomes a conversation starter. You can even ask your grandmother to contribute her own wedding china from 1952!
Vintage brass items from local markets create stunning accent pieces too. We have used old brass urns as flower vases, antique scales as unique serving pieces, and vintage brass trays as charger plates. There is something magical about incorporating pieces that have witnessed decades of celebrations – they bring an energy that new items simply cannot match.
Vertical gardens have revolutionized our approach to wedding venue decor in India completely. Instead of expensive floral walls that last only a day, we see a shift in couples towards living installations using local climbing plants, moss, and seasonal foliage that thrives long after the wedding. For indoor venues, we have mastered the art of temporary living walls using modular planting systems that can be easily installed and removed.
We created our most ambitious living wall for a couple in Mumbai who wanted to bring the Western Ghats into their urban venue. Working with a local botanist, we sourced native ferns, moss, and flowering vines that naturally grow in that region’s forests. The 20-foot living wall took three weeks to establish, but by wedding day, it looked like a piece of the rainforest had been transported indoors. Guests couldn’t stop taking photos, and the oxygen-rich environment actually made the indoor space feel fresher. One living wall we created three years ago is still thriving in a couple’s backyard, now serving as a natural privacy screen for their patio.
Cloth napkins might seem like a small detail, but they make an enormous difference both environmentally and aesthetically. We have started collaborating with women’s cooperatives across India to source hand-block printed napkins that reflect regional textile traditions. For a Rajasthani wedding, we used indigo-dyed napkins created by artisans in Bagru – the deep blue color looked stunning against copper plates, and each napkin carried the story of traditional craftsmanship.
The best part? After the wedding, these napkins become part of the couple’s household collection. It is a beautiful way to extend the wedding’s impact to support craft communities long after the celebration ends.
Hemp table runners have become another favorite of ours. They photograph beautifully in natural light, get softer with each wash, and age gracefully over time.
Natural elements look timeless, and at the same time, comes without environmental guilt. Sand art installations work beautifully for beach or desert weddings across different continents. Layering different colored natural sands in glass vessels creates stunning centerpieces that reflect the landscape. For coastal celebrations, you can use the sand from the actual beach where the ceremony takes place to make each arrangement deeply authentic. For mountain weddings, you can create ceremony circles using stones collected from local riverbeds – perhaps to make a walkway to the stage.
Sustainable water elements bring serenity without waste. Fountains designed using recycled materials and solar-powered pumps can create gentle water sounds throughout outdoor ceremonies.
“Fragrance pathways” are another top sustainable wedding decor idea. You could create “scent walkways” where guests walk through different aromatic experiences – perhaps starting with fresh eucalyptus at the entrance, moving through rose-scented ceremony areas, and ending with warm spices like cinnamon and cardamom in dining spaces. These natural scents trigger emotional memories that last far longer than visual elements alone, creating lasting impressions that guests will associate with your special day. Maybe for winter weddings, the scent could be of hot chocolate and marshmallows!
This is perfect for weddings in any season while being completely natural and biodegradable – and the technique works whether you are celebrating in chilly European winters, cool Indian hill stations, or crisp Australian beaches.
Creating an eco-friendly wedding is never about sacrifice. You just have to have the intention and the right team (with creativity!). Every sustainable choice you make adds layers of meaning to your celebration while protecting the world you are building together. The couples we work with often tell us their eco-friendly weddings felt more authentic and memorable than anything they could have achieved with conventional decor. When your decor choices align with your values, your wedding becomes a reflection of who you are as a couple and the future you want to create together.
Your wedding day marks the beginning of your shared story. Why not start that story by showing love and respect for the planet that brought you together? With thoughtful planning and creative vision, you can have the wedding of your dreams while leaving the world a little more beautiful than you found it.
