From Guest Blogger Izzie: Green Engagement Party Ideas

Weddings are wasteful. Typically, a lot of the expense goes into things that don’t get used again, like decorations, presents, and attire. Even those that strive to be eco-friendly end up clocking in with potentially huge environmental impact from family and friends driving or flying in for the wedding.

Thankfully, it is quite a bit easier to be green when it comes to the engagement party. As there is less pressure to “wow”, especially if the proposal was spectacular, you can tone down the spending. And engagement parties are rife with opportunities to be eco-friendly, without that compromising on the quality of the party.

Below, you’ll find some eco-friendly engagement party ideas, that will help you save money, and reduce your impact on the environment, whilst still allowing you to create a memorable night.  
Location

We’ll start with perhaps the biggest choice you’ll have to make. As we said, part of the problem with weddings is their environmental impact, thanks in part to all of the family and friends scattered far and wide. With the engagement party, you have more room to maneuver.

As you are freed up to pick a venue, as they are easier to come by than churches, pick the most centralised venue you can. This will work for everyone relatively local, but the problem is those who live out of town. If you really want to lessen their impact, invite them to send in a video message or call in on Skype and the like, instead of making the massive journey. They are still coming to the wedding regardless!
Advice

Now we can focus on the party itself. Recycling paper and card goes a long way at weddings and engagements parties. Invites, for example, should be made of recycled materials, and can contain a not suggesting that the recipient recycles afterwards. Inside the invite, you can took another piece of card, asking for advice for the new couple

Couples are always bombarded with advice, so this is a nice way to streamline the process, and make a unique decoration scheme. When you collect the advice cards back in, you can pin them around the venue, giving everyone something to look at and giving the couple a lasting memory.
Photos

Photos are ever presents at engagement parties, so you need to find a balance between flooding every inch of wallspace with pictures of the couple, and showing a nice history of the couple from the first time they met until now. Making a collage and putting it all in one place accomplishes both of these things.

Gather up old photos, and arrange them on a backboard in chronological order. Start with the oldest photos, and work all the way up to popping the question. The added benefit to all this is you are using photos that already exist, so there is no need to print new ones.
Video hashtag

Finally, an option you may not have noticed. Engagement photos are a great thing to have, but a lot of materials get used up if every guest wants a picture with the bride and groom, on top off all the other photos taken. One way to reduce this impact is to funnel photos and videos through social media.

Create an account, or create a hashtag, and encourage your guests to post their photos and videos with this hashtag included. Then once the party is over, you have a nicely organised digital record of photos and videos, that you can then store in one file, without a single piece of paper being used.