Ashridge Great Barn Environmental Policy
We’re all becoming more aware of the impact our choices have on the world around us and the ramifications of these impacts for people near and far both in time and space.
As a working farm we are not only witness to these effects but also at the forefront of making changes to combat them. As a wedding business we’re well aware of the problems with waste within the wedding industry and passionate about doing our best to make sure that our couples are able to have as little impact as they choose to on their big day. This can range from making sure that your food waste is composted and your flowers go to a local nursing home to helping you source biodegradable plates and local ingredients along with your caterer.
We take our inspiration from the Ashridge Great Barn itself. The Barn is the epitome of locally soured with the timber coming from the farm woodland, the clay for the cob being dug out of the hillside where the building now nestles and the stone coming from a quarry further down the valley. The tin is from Wales and is the building material which has travelled the furthest. We were lucky to work with some amazing local craftsmen in restoring the Barn who shared our love for old buildings and local resources and were able to restore the building within the same spirit.
We aim to be zero-waste with our own events, although the sad reality is that many things come wrapped in plastic film. To this end we use vintage crockery and cutlery rather than disposable options. We take great care to source ingredients as locally as possible and bake the cakes and other goodies that we sell. We provide bins for recycling and anything that can be composted will be!
Our water is sourced from a borehole on site and all our waste is processed in a bio-digester here as well. We’re currently looking at the cost of sourcing our electricity from sustainable sources too.
We’re proud to work with a range of wedding and event suppliers who share our environmental concerns and who are also working towards a more sustainable wedding industry in the future. We’re all convinced that a beautiful, meaningful wedding doesn’t have to cost the earth in any sense of the phrase.
Please feel free to ask us about our environmental credentials – we love talking about the journey we’re on!
