When wedding season strikes, the Green Guy ups his game
The cycle begins in late winter. Thick envelopes start to arrive, requesting my presence in Portland or Peoria or Perth. “Mr. and Mrs. So-and-So Invite You to Celebrate the Wedding of Their Daughter, Smaller So-and-So.” I’m forced to buy plane tickets, suits and gifts as a show of friendship and… I’m actually happy to do so.
I love weddings! What’s better than an open bar and a night full of Black-Eyed Peas songs with your current and former pals? Okay, so maybe I could do without the repeated “I’ve Got A Feeling” covers, but everything else is great. As a Green Guy, though, I’ve had to really up my game for the green wedding circuit.
Getting ready for a wedding in any sort of green way is a bit tricky. Usually, I try to stick with neutral scents in my products, but when I know I’ll be talking/dancing/sweating close to other people, I aim for something that will make me smell fresh all night long. Enter Lather’s Eucalyptus and Clay Soap made with 100% organic olive oil. The fresh eucalyptus appeals to wedding dance partners as well as any koalas that may be in attendance.
I want my hair on point, too, so I turn to Every Man Jack’s Daily Shampoo, with a mild sandalwood fragrance. It’s just enough to show that I’m manly, without shouting to the world, “Hey! I work in a forest!” Hair at weddings isn’t just about smell, though. It’s also about style, and since I’ve gotten the same haircut since I was 14, style, to me, means hair products. For years, I used gels and creams that had all sorts of chemicals in them. Now that I’ve gone green, I’ve been struggling to find a natural pomade that does the job. One of the best I’ve found is ManCave’s whiskey-scented style cream. I don’t know how much whiskey I smell in it (although it does smell great), but it holds my faux-hawk nicely and it’s super pliable, which means I can easily change my look when somebody makes fun of me for having a faux-hawk in 2015.
Now weddings aren’t just about your hair and how you smell. They’re also about your clothes. I haven’t found an all-organic suit that fits my needs—yet—but I have been looking at green accessories and discovered some nice ones. If you’re into bow ties, ties and pocket squares, Baltimore’s Craft Culture Co. isn’t a bad way to go. They source and manufacture their products directly through independent craftspeople in Thailand and the results are quite elegant. There’s a natural, textural quality to their silks that I really dig.
To keep my ties looking crisp, I went through product curators Kauffman Mercantile to secure a solid brass tie clip from Studebaker Metals, hand-forged in Pittsburgh, a city with a great history when it comes to metal-working. There’s no coating or plating used, so this is about as natural as you can get and the clip is created from a solid piece of brass with just a hammer, an anvil and fire.
It reminds me of the hard work that goes into making a marriage work—which is what I plan to tell all the couples whose weddings I attend this summer. “Get ready,” I’ll tell them, “for you have to be prepared to forge your marriage using only a hammer, an anvil and fire to make it work. Or at least find a good therapist.”
They’ll appreciate that, right?
Green Wedding Gear for Natural Nuptials
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