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Colours all year! Young couples combine Holi and weddings, two fun occasions
Young couples are including Holi, the fun festival of colours, in their wedding celebrations. The result is very, very vibrant — be in a haldi ceremony or at a pre-wedding couple shoot.
What’s the element common to a big community festival like Holi and big fat Indian weddings? It’s the hours and hours of merriment with family and friends — and the fun includes lip-smacking dishes and peppy music. The newest trend that has hit the wedding industry is combining these two enjoyable occasions. Sounds like double the fun!
Recently, when Masoom Minawala, a popular Mumbai-based fashion blogger, got married, she kick-started her wedding festivities with a colourful Holi party, instead of the customary cocktail night. She says, “I wanted to throw a unique party where guests would let their hair down and have a good time without making an effort to look glamorous. So, I thought of mixing a wedding function with an exciting festival like Holi — that turned out to be an excellent idea. It reminded us of our childhood memories and emotions attached to it. I tried the colours a month in advance to make sure it didn’t have any side effects.”
Another bride, Shweta Acharya, who is a wedding planner by profession, opted for a vibrant Holi-themed haldi ceremony — rather haldi festivities — for her wedding. She says, “Haldi is the first function before the marriage ceremony and both sides — the bridegroom’s and the bride’s families — were officially meeting each other for the first time. So to break the ice and awkwardness among the families and, at the same time, to add a fun factor, my fiancé and I decided to have a haldi-Holi function. Also, [it was] because my fiancé is from Bihar and they celebrate Holi in a grand way there.”
Shweta adds, “Apart from just the organic colours, we incorporated water balloons and flower petals to showcase an ambience of the real festival.” The Delhi-based wedding photographer, Prasheila Lookhar, who shot this Holi-themed haldi ceremony, feels that making Holi a part of the wedding functions is an excellent way to include the younger people in the festivities; otherwise, they might not be interested in participating in the age-old traditional ceremonies.
A lot of young couples are also opting for smoke bombs and colour sticks as props in their pre-wedding shoots. Shruti Khanna, a Gurgaon-based wedding photographer, says, “They’re altogether choosing to play Holi, especially for pictures, to add a dash of drama and make pictures look young and fun.”
Jayant Chhabra, a wedding photographer who partners Khanna, says, “Everybody likes happy and vibrant photographs, and colours play an important role as they scream fun, which eventually leads to joyful and lively photos.” Anupa Shah, a Mumbai-based wedding photographer, believes that Holi colours make one get into a cheerful mood, “especially if the shoot is scheduled in the months of spring or summer, it’s a good alternative to the usual OTT shoots, for which you have to dress up”.
However, there is the occasional letdown. Abhimanyu Sharma, photography partner to Lookhar, did a Holi-themed pre-wedding shoot last year. He says, “Most shoots happen in a secluded place and sometimes they turn out to be a failure, too, as we need to be careful about timings, and we need to carry spare props.”
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