Nice Day for a Green Wedding

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The best I could find was Rawganique, which has two styles in hemp and organic cotton under $100.

Maybe smaller items, like say, lingerie, would turn out to be cheaper and more amusing. Ciel and Enamore have cute lines of bra, panty, and camisole confections made up of different combinations of silk, hemp, soy, and organic cotton for between $45 and $85. And they sport enough lace to make them vavavoom! Made in Britain, they can be harder to find in the U.S. but online shops such as the Natural Store, and New York City stores such as Kaight, carry them.

But enough distractions; back to the dress hunt. It's time to go haute couture. Or at least eco-fashionista. Danish designer Peter Ingwersen makes sleek use of organic cotton in his Noir Illuminati line, sold at Neiman Marcus. The fitted black pants are gathered at the cuff and the sophisticated ruffled shirts come in black and white and are paired with tightly tailored jackets. The U.S.'s Linda Loudermilk's spring line is more playful. She uses sweet sheer yellow and white polka dotted fabrics for shirts and dresses with beautifully gathered ruffled cuffs. But of course they cost designer prices, running between $500 and a $900.

The Best Bet: Rent A Dress

I also checked out Anna Cohen and Stewart + Brown online. Cohen is a classic for work and play with nice pencil skirts, modern tailored suit jackets, and a drape dress in soy, hemp, and bamboo. Stewart + Brown's spring collection is more relaxed and has darling summer slip dresses along with basic camisoles and tees.

It was around this time, at what turned out to be the end of my search, that I began wondering whether it made sense to buy organic. According to the Organic Trade Assn., cotton uses about 25% of the world's insecticides and more than 10% of the pesticides. A recent Cambridge study found that over the lifetime of a shirt, a polyester shirt uses less energy than a cotton shirt to make and clean. However, you can mitigate this impact by using lower washing temperatures and by air drying clothes. So on balance, it still seemed to make sense to buy organic.

The Cambridge study, though, pointed out what I knew at the start of my search: The best bet, really, is to reduce, reuse, recycle. That means buying fewer pieces of clothing and buying things secondhand. The study even evoked a market for leased clothing. For the moment, that might seem farfetched for everyday duds. But it made me think back to my grandmother's shop, where men rented tuxedos. A quick Google search, and I had learned that it's fairly easy to rent bridal dresses these days. More stores have recently popped up in New York City that do this and I have checked a few of them out online. Now, I just have to jump in the car, er, take the subway I mean, and see what they have to offer.

Green is an associate editor for BusinessWeek.