Highlights from the 2025 Sustainable Essex Awards

Last month we celebrated those who embed sustainability into their work at the Sustainable Essex Awards. Several departments and students across our campuses came together to be recognised for their projects that contribute to our Sustainability Sub Strategy areas. As a sustainability event we have to consider sustainable choices at all aspects of event planning, as a result we wanted to share the sustainability credentials of our event and to help those wanting to plan an event with sustainability in mind.

Rethinking the Awards

This year we wanted to redesign our awards to work alongside our new award levels; bronze, silver, gold and platinum. Our new awards meant new trophy designs, and we wanted to reflect that Essex feel while incorporating environmentally friendly practices.

Our awards were 3D printed this year meaning they were made from polylactic acid or polylactide (PLA) which is a renewable biomass typically from fermented plant starch like corn, cassava, sugarcane or sugar beet pulp. Environmental considerations were not just part of the production process; our trophies were made locally in Colchester further reducing the carbon footprint of their transportation.

Sustainable Styling

Sourcing decorations for an event sustainably and on a budget can be tricky. Working with our Edge Hotel Students; Misato and Chelsy we were able to source decorations from Wivenhoe House Hotel and reuse decorations rather than buy new. We also enlisted the help of smalls ads and our wonderful university community to borrow office plants to give our event space that nature feel.

As part of our regular practice we additionally used undated materials like we do for each event to be reused again and again, this included our SDG icons and our new icons designed to illustrate each of our Sustainability Sub-Strategy topic areas.

A Plant-Based Menu

To reduce our event’s carbon footprint even further we chose to have a vegetarian and vegan menu only. Eating more plant-based alternatives require fewer resources like water and land and produce lower greenhouse gas emissions compared to meat production. Making these small changes can make a big impact on the carbon footprint of an event.

If you're planning an event and want to make it more sustainable—or if you’ve already hosted one and want to showcase your efforts—we’d love to hear from you!

Get in touch: sustainability@essex.ac.uk

Together, we can continue to build a culture of sustainability at Essex—one event at a time.