The genesis of the Ethical Wedding

I was never really one of those girls who was too fussed about getting married. I certainly never dreamed about big white dresses - I'm too short and untidy for that kind of thing; I'd just end up looking like a meringue that had been dragged through a hedge backwards. And my innate cynicism meant that I spent most of my teens and twenties making sweeping statements about marriage as An Institution of The Capitalist State. I may have been right.
So when Overgrown Antipodean, my boyfriend and cohabitee, popped the question in a way that was more romantic than I ever though he was capable of being, I had to start thinking quickly. When you get engaged, EVERYONE wants to know what you're planning, and 'Ummmm.... it seems like quite a long way away...???' doesn't seem to be an acceptable answer.
And then of course there's the fact that I've spent most of my professional life researching all the evil and unpleasant things that capitalism, corporations and consumerism have wrought on the world. If I'm going to have a really special day on my Big Day, then a chain hotel suite, rings of questionable origin, foodservice company meals, industrially-grown flowers and the tidal wave of overpriced tat, manufactured in China by underpaid and overworked ununionised labour, that an entire industry really wants to sell you are not getting a look-in. Not if I can help it.
This blog will, at least on current intentions, be the record of how I try to avoid all this, and still have what I hope will be a lovely wedding day, and hopefully a way of sharing ideas and horrors with other women trying to do it differently...