When I blogged about Andrea Parrish and Peter Geyer — an engaged couple collecting and recycling aluminum cans to pay for their wedding — I had a feeling they were awesome. And then I talked to them and confirmed it: this Spokane duo is officially super-cool.
The pair has been making national headlines for their ingenious — and eco-friendly — plan to fund their nuptials, and they graciously took some time away from their nearly all-consuming can project to talk with Tonic about how it all got started and the impressive progress they’ve made to date.
“I got the idea at around one in the morning about a month ago,” Andrea said with an almost infectious enthusiasm. “Peter actually smelts aluminum as a hobby and I was just staring at all our cans and the idea just slapped me upside the head.”
She quickly shared her inspired plan with Peter, who creates art with the aluminum he smelts, and although he was slightly wary of his bride-to-be’s rather unconventional idea, he quickly signed on. “I was a little surprised. I wasn’t quite expecting her to come up with that particular idea. I was concerned about all the cans we would need.”
Peter’s concern was not unfounded. They crunched the numbers and realized they would need a staggering 400,000 cans to raise the $3,500 to $4,000 they would need for their nuptials. (And yes, you read that earlier blog post correctly: The couple is planning a decidedly budget-conscious affair with “medieval flavors,” as per their shared interest.)
Although 400,000 cans sounded rather daunting, the couple decided to give their wacky plan a shot. They set up a Web site, weddingcans.com, a facebook page and a twitter account, and recruited friends and family to donate as many cans as possible. Their plan soon got a big boost when Andrea, a marketing/communications manager and self-professed alterna-bride, shared her scheme with her new pals on the offbeatbride.com message board, which led to a feature on the site. Their idea quickly caught the mainstream media’s attention, and the cans started rolling in. As of midday Sunday they collected about 91,352 cans (25,781 actual cans and 66,571 in the cash equivalent to the recycled cans, via the PayPal account set up on their site). Although they still have well over 300,000 cans to go, they have already achieved 22 percent of their goal in just a few weeks, and feel confident they’ll meet their goal by July.
“The response has been astounding,” says a clearly humbled Peter. “It’s kind of exciting actually. You get to see the response of everyone around you, all your community members come out of the woodwork.”
The couple doesn’t seem to mind how the cans have kinda taken over their lives temporarily. Andrea says their house is so full of can-filled sacks that “we create little paths to walk through. It’s really taken over our living room.”
Regardless, they’re not afraid to roll up their sleeves for the projects because, as Andrea explains, working with used aluminum cans is often messy work. Whether they pick up cans from locals using her brother’s pickup truck, or receive cans that arrive at their house or Peter’s work, Instant Sign Factory in Spokane, the process is the same: they sort through the cans to make sure they are all aluminum — people often mix steel and aluminum and they must be separated because the recycling process is much different — then clean up the liquid often left inside before bagging the cans, weighing them and adding them to their ever-growing pile.
It’s a labor-intensive procedure, but well worth it for the couple because they are working toward a dual goal: helping the Earth and helping them fund the wedding of their dreams. The very personal and fun affair at a Hope, Idaho castle will feature DIY decorations, home-brewed beer and fun medieval touches like a sword fight or two and the bouquet to be thrown via a catapult-type contraption. The whole event is pretty much in line with the spirit of this non-traditional couple, who got engaged at Andrea’s sister’s wedding last year. Peter caught the garter belt, which prompted Andrea to drop to one knee and present Peter with the opal earring she had stashed away for just such an opportunity.
Despite the silliness, it’s clear Andrea and Peter are serious about their can project, and about recycling in general. And even though they are encouraging out-of-towners to recycle cans and kick some proceeds their way via their Web site, it’s also cool with them if their plan simply inspires you to recycle — even if you don’t give them a cent.
“I would love it if people would recycle and send us a small bit of the money for the wedding,” explains Peter. “But the grand scheme is to just get more people to recycle. Our planet is the only one we’ve got. We need to take care of it so it will take care of us.”
Photos courtesy of Andrea Parrish and Peter Geyer