The post Fair Trade Wedding – Kathleen & Russell appeared first on All That's Fair..
]]>We are a young couple from the Midwest who have a laid-back and eclectic style. Our first home is an apartment in Bloomington, Indiana (Home of the Hoosiers!) and we’ve worked hard to make hand-me-down furniture and thrift store kick-knacks look cohesive. I am a self-proclaimed “lazy girl crafter” meaning I love homemade, unique decorations but don’t have the patience for long projects. With Fair Trade items you get quality craftsmanship without having to do it yourself – perfect! After learning about and becoming an advocate for Fair Trade in college, Russell and I were excited to find a wedding registry to promote the cause.
Without further ado, here are a few of Kathleen & Russell’s favorite fair trade products!
1. Turquoise Paisley Table Runner
This beautiful table runner makes our $10 garage sale table look much greater than it’s worth. There are beautiful bits of red and yellow in the design which inspired the color scheme for our living space.
2. Turquoise Blue Vetiver Placemats
These placemats tie in well with the Paisley Table Runner. Best of all, you can throw
them in the washing machine with no damage done!
3. Green Ginkgo Pot Holder
My great-grandma’s favorite tree was the Ginkgo. She would display the dried leaves on the wall of her apartment, among the other oddities that she collected. This pot holder is sentimental, cheery, and bright.
4. Blown Glass Pitcher
In my opinion, this pitcher is one of the most beautiful items on the site. I can’t wait for winter to be over so we can sit on our porch and drink lemonade from it!
5. Handblown Drinking Glasses
These glasses, like the pitcher, are beautiful yet sturdy. We use them daily, but we’re also sure to put them out when guests are over!
Thanks again Kathleen, for the fabulous list of products and your awesome product descriptions! If you are interested in having your favorite fair trade products featured, email me and I will give you more details!
wedding photography: Maggie Russo // engagement photography: Abbey Grim Photography
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]]>The post Real Couple’s Favorite Fair Trade Products – Ashleigh & Collin appeared first on All That's Fair..
]]>As you’ll be able to tell in our favorite products collage, we LOVE anything to do with the beach. Although we both grew up in the midwest, a piece of our hearts have always lived at the beach. After living in California for 5 years, we celebrated our dream wedding on Coronado Beach with several of our closest friends and family members.
We live in a little (well, tiny) beach bungalow in Pacific Beach, San Diego. Our decorating style incorporates our love for the beach, with lots of aqua and sand tones, and artsy splashes of bright colors. We love bringing home small ethnic pieces from our travels around the world.
We, of course, love so many things we carry at Seven Hopes United, but here are a few favorites we received from family & friends for our wedding!
1. Large Capiz Bowl – Teal
This capiz bowl is one of my all time favorites…the colors are brilliant, and it’s the perfect accent piece for our beach bungalow. I primarily use it as a fruit bowl, but enjoy using it to serve salads when we have guests over for dinner.
2. Blue Diamond Vase
This piece has a special meaning to us as it was made in one of the villages we visited on our trip to Nicaragua. The people and the artisans there were part of what inspired us to start Seven Hopes United.
3. Graphic Lidded Hamper – Aqua Comb (Currently Unavailable)
We received this storage basket as a gift from my new sister-in-law and her family. It is so beautiful & the perfect color for our aqua/green bathroom. I use it for storing extra towels, beach blankets, etc.
4. Fig Stripe Vetiver Placemats
I love the natural smell of these placemats & the color works great with our cream and aqua dishes!
If you are interested in having your favorite fair trade products featured, email me and I will give you more details (it is easy and painless, I promise)!
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]]>The post Real Couple’s Favorite Fair Trade Products – Theresa & Greg appeared first on All That's Fair..
]]>Greg being the outdoorsy type and Theresa the crafty type, their decorating style is artsy with bits of rustic nature. They’ve hung artistic photos of their travels throughout their home, and incorporated them with unique finds from thrift stores, handmade items, etc. When registering for fair trade products at Seven Hopes United, they stuck to the classics with a bit of handmade flair.
Without further ado, here are a few of Theresa & Greg’s favorite fair trade products!
1. Sliced Persimmon Mango Wood Bowl
2. Sweet Coconut & Vanilla & Spice Soap
3. White Wolof Fair Trade Storage Basket
4. Vintage Sari Throw
If you are interested in having your favorite fair trade products featured, email me and I will give you more details (it is easy and painless, I promise)!
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]]>The post Real Couple’s Favorite Fair Trade Products – Kelly & Michael appeared first on All That's Fair..
]]>If you are interested in having your favorite fair trade products featured, email me and I will give you more details (it is easy and painless, I promise)!
Michael and I love to travel. Our experiences living, working, and traveling in Europe and beyond opened our eyes to the world around us. I was an exchange student in France in high school and college. Michael worked and lived in a suburb of London for two years. I also spent one month living with Japanese family friends in a suburb of Tokyo called Kichijoji.
I discovered Seven Hopes United at the Rancho Santa Fe Farmers Market about 2 years ago. Ashleigh is a great person and I loved the sometimes rustic, always beautiful handmade artistry of all of the Fair Trade items. The linens, aprons, and especially the wooden pieces have always been favorites.
Michael and I were thrilled to find out that Seven Hopes United had a wedding registry, and were very happy to have them be a part of our wedding. I LOVE LOVE Seven Hopes United’s products. Michael and I felt good about supporting the Fair Trade value system by registering with Seven Hopes United for our wedding. We are more mindful of the Fair Trade movement thanks to Ashleigh and Seven Hopes United. We now go out of our way to buy Fair Trade products whenever possible.
-Kelly
1) Vintage Sari Throw (See their engagement photo above!)
We bought a vintage sari throw specifically for our Engagement photo shoot. One of our favorite Engagement photos by Bethann Greenberg Photography has us lying on the blanket. I use the sari throw around the house to keep warm and keep it on my futon in my Craft Room (my special place).
2) Twisted Olive Wood Server Set
These are hanging on the wall in our kitchen/dining area. They are too beautiful to store in a drawer!
3) Rustic Guapinol Serving Bowl (Sorry, no longer available)
Bought for us by my “French exchange family.” I stayed with a French family for the summer after my sophomore year of high school. My French exchange family came to our wedding (we were so excited to see the two of them…) The bowl is currently on our kitchen table.
4) Citrus Splash Goblets
I love the colorful yellow & orange blown glass goblets, they too are on display in our bay window.
5) Gingko Orange Apron
I have 2 aprons from Seven Hopes United that I LOVE (the orange Gingko apron and my current Fav, the Kenzie Apron…love love my Kenzie apron! It fits to perfection!)
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]]>The post Real Couple’s Favorite Fair Trade Products – Casey & Dave appeared first on All That's Fair..
]]>Dave and I live in sunny Southern California, where blue skies and bright colors abound. So we like to reflect that in our decorating style! We enjoy variety and a fun color palette and nothing too serious or complicated. When registering for items from Seven Hopes United, we chose practical items in fresh, fun patterns and textures. I love the variety of items at Seven Hopes and obviously the fair trade concept, which is what drew us to the site in the first place. When I began searching for “fair trade wedding gifts” on the Internet, I was pleasantly surprised to find Seven Hopes. I knew that most fair trade products were unique and beautiful, but I was especially in love with many of the items on the Seven Hopes site. Here are few of my favorites that we received from our registry. – Casey
1) Large Green Stripe Mango Wood Salad Bowl
This bowl brightens up the table every night and, to be honest, makes salad more appealing! It’s a beautiful design and makes dinner a bit more of an “event.”
2) Antiqued Elephant Wine Bottle Cork
It’s the little things that make me smile, and the elephant reminds me of our honeymoon in Thailand!
3) Love Bowl
Perfect for holding fruit or any type of cute table display. Solves that “what to put in the middle of the table” problem!
4) Cobalt Classics Drinking Glasses
These glasses are elegant but with a fun pop of color at the top.
5) Passion Flower Citrus Napkins
Love these for having friends over; they’re perfect for a fun and laid-back dinner party!
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]]>The post Real Couple’s Favorite Fair Trade Products – Jessie & Nancy appeared first on All That's Fair..
]]>We live in Baltimore, Maryland and got married in a religious/community-based ceremony on June 2, 2012. We were able to make our marriage legal in Maryland this past January. Nancy works as a palliative care social worker at a hospital and Jessie is an attorney who works primarily in the areas of civil rights and workplace justice. It was important to us to have our wedding reflect our values and we were excited by the idea of our wedding having a positive impact on our community and the causes we believe in.
To that end, we chose the beautiful Irvine Nature Center, an environmental education center, in Owings Mills, Maryland as our wedding venue, had all vegan food (including bicycle-powered smoothies!), and composted all the leftovers. We also asked our guests to donate to some local nonprofits that we love or to help us advocate for marriage equality in Maryland this past fall in lieu of tangible wedding gifts. But, recognizing that guests would also want to give us physical presents, we set out to find a fair trade wedding registry. We were thrilled to find Seven Hopes United–the products were fantastic, the customer service exceptional, and, most importantly, we could feel good about receiving gifts knowing they were helping to lift communities out of poverty through fair labor practices. We also loved that by registering with Seven Hopes United, we could help raise the profile of fair trade goods among our guests.
- Jessie & Nancy
1) Large Capiz Bowl Olive
The colors are really beautiful–almost iridescent. A great bowl for fruit or salads.
2) Tumblers – Cobalt Dreams and matching 3) Cobalt Blue Glass Pitcher
These are stunning and we use the tumblers on a daily basis. We’ve gotten so many compliments about these–the color is really striking. They also seem to cool us down by at least 15 degrees when used in the heat of summer.
4) Mountain Ridge Turkish Towels
We love the texture of these, but we feel especially attached to these towels because they survived our recent dryer fire! We think it must’ve been their good fair trade karma that saved them…
5) Ceramic Appetizer Set – Festive Feast (Sorry, Currently Unavailable)
This piece is beautiful and the removable dishes make it very handy for serving snacks and dips. We sort of feel like show-offs when we put this out when guests are over, but then we get to tell folks it’s fair trade when they ask us about it!
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]]>The post Real Couple’s Favorite Fair Trade Products – Jesse & Michael appeared first on All That's Fair..
]]>Jesse & Michael, a newlywed couple living in Maine so graciously volunteered to help us out. Not only did this beautiful couple look amazing on their wedding day, they have some great picks for us! A HUGE thanks to Jesse & Michael for participating. If you are a previous registrant, and are interested in having your favorite products featured, email me and I will give you more details (it’s easy & painless, I promise)!
On May 6, 2012, almost four years to the day from when we first met, Mike and I married in Castine, Maine, on a rocky point with Grindle’s Eddy swirling ahead of us in the harbor. Our wedding guests, along with friends and family, included four seals (drawn to the bagpiper perhaps), a Bald Eagle, a loon and three dogs.
Initially, we didn’t want to register anywhere, but our families pointed out it was more for our guests than us. We were thrilled to find 7 Hopes United as an alternative to the usual big chain stores. The organization’s mission reflects our commitment to the environment, to “giving back” and to supporting small businesses and artisans. It is now our top choice for purchasing wedding and other gifts, as well as items for our home.
We currently live in Maine, with no plans to leave. Mike is a marine systems engineer, I am a freelance journalist and communications consultant and our black lab/golden retriever mix, Alice, is a lovable, energetic menace to society. Our style is a blend of coastal living and country. As wooden boat sailors, we gravitate towards wooden pieces –even our wedding rings are made of wood– and soft, earth-tone colors.
- Jesse
1) Large Capiz Bowl Sunset
We received these first two gifts as a set and love them – especially for salads! The deep red of the bowl is a gorgeous backdrop for greens and other veggies.
2) Twisted Olive Wood Server Set
The olive wood serving set is so unique and versatile. We get compliments every time we use them.
3) Dragonfly Vase
With the dragonflies as the centerpiece, this vase looks beautiful with or without flowers. I particularly love the light jade color as it happens to be my favorite shade of green.
4) Brooklyn Slate Cheese Board
This is one of our favorite items. We use it regularly when we have company to set out whatever new cheeses we are trying from the local co-op. With the soapstone chalk, you can label each cheese directly on the slate – or draw silly faces, depending on your mood.
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