Your guide to plan an intimate wedding at home

It’s time to bid adieu to grand wedding celebrations, large buffet spreads and massive venues. Instead guests are now welcomed with temperature checks and hand sanitisers. And if you’re confused from where to begin planning the big day of your life with small scale celebrations, you’ve come to the right place! With pro tricks and tips from experts from the wedding industry on invites, menus and entertainment and more, here’s how you can plan an intimate wedding at home.

Begin with personalised invites

As most couples are choosing to get married at home, invites should resonate the sentiment too, feels Simran Monga, a wedding invite designer. She says, “The whole point is having the closed ones together at a 50-guest wedding, so add elements of what home means to you in the digital invite that exudes warmness. For instance, the design could have a bit of a hint of genda phool from your garden.”

Wedding menu—Quality over quantity

Tania Nijhawan, founder of Fork ‘N’ Spoon, a catering company says, “The servers and chefs should be equipped with gloves, masks and face shields for extra precautions but best is to not have too many of them around.” She also adds, “Avoid live counters, stick to one or two cuisines because more variety of cuisines will mean more chefs to prepare the food.” Talking about if immunity boosters are a good choice for the menu, she says, “People will be attending weddings once in two months, so skip the immunity boosters and let guests indulge because nevertheless we are doing it a lot at home.”

 

D for décor and Do-It-Yourself?

This is the time to bring your Pinterest boards live and the creative side of you. Wedding planner Kaveri Vij says, “For the décor, try your hand at DIY props for the backdrop where your ceremony will take place and add centerpieces to beautiful corners of your house.” She also adds, “For a fun element yet playing ‘safe’, you could get personalised masks made or even get the bottles of the sanitiser personalised and place them on the table and guests could take them as a small gift.”

Upcycling wedding wear?

If you are a bride-to-be and haven’t purchased the lehenga and jewellery yet for the big day, fret not. Refurbishing a sari that you always eyed on from your mom’s closet is a great idea. Mix and match the jewellery from her treasure trove. Stylist Tanya Ghavri says, “I feel it’s all about how pieces are kept over the years and I think our parents know more than us how to safeguard important pieces.”

Dance and dhamaka!

Wedding planner Akshay Chopra recommends deciding on what events to have for the celebrations. He says, “Have a mehendi function with only the ladies, connect speakers and play a mehendi playlist. We have been planning virtual sangeet nights as well, where everyone grooves to the DJ at their respective homes and some people even perform for the bride and groom, and to teach them we have our choreographers taking classes virtually.”

 

How to involve guests virtually

Vij recommends, “Send out recipes of a mocktail/cocktail to everyone, everyone can cheer with, for the newly-weds.” Chopra, adds, “Have live streaming option and do a run through a day prior. Webinars are a great format till the ceremony is going on, open to conversation and wishes post that, have someone chair the wedding and guide just like a wedding host.” Also make sure to customise a background for guests to bring a sense of intimacy that makes them feel a part of your wedding, suggests Monga.

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