THEN AND NOW
Wedding planners in the times gone by were members of the extended family. Today, outsourcing has become the name of the game.
Why mother-in-law used to fondly reminisce about her wedding held at the ancestral home in an ‘agraharam’ in Cuddalore. A pandal was erected along the entire street and all homes in the ‘agraharam’ participated in the planning and execution of the wedding. Those were times when a Bombay Chitappa would handle invitations, an Allahabad Athai would decide the menu and an Athimber would be in charge of stores and provisions and his job would essentially entail running to the market several times to replenish the fast depleting delicacies. Long lost cousins would descend to take over the many responsibilities.
With the advent of nuclear families, the wedding process has shrunk and new concepts like combining the 'nischayadartham' or engagement and the reception lessoned the burden on the parents.
Enter the wedding planners and the scenario undergoes a sea change. As Indians, we have perfected the art of outsourcing and weddings are no exception. Today, weddings have become a multi-pronged celebration with several details like designer invites to unique return gifts and all that parents have to do is loosen the purse strings and sit back and enjoy the festivities.
Four years ago, the CEO of one of the companies for whom we were conducting corporate events asked my sister and me, to takeover the planning of his daughter’s wedding. It was with a little trepidation that we accepted. Two months of meticulous planning and the excitement of constantly challenging our mind to think out of the box and we were ready for D-Day. We had taken over all responsibilities from designing and printing of invites, décor of the venue for each occasion, arranging mehendi and sangeet parties, priests , caterers, nadaswaram, musicians for the reception performance, make up and hair do for the bride, packing of trousseau and gift items and ‘Tamboolam’ bags too. The loads of appreciation we received for our first assignment egged us on and Event Art’s wedding division was born. Today four years and forty weddings later, I must confess that the constant challenge to be innovative and the joyous response from the brides and their families more than compensates for the hard grind.
From choreographing a dance number with a rain items (complete with props like umbrellas and rain coats) to beat the mid-summer heat at Goa for a sangeet, to arranging flair bar tenders and mid-eastern performers for an Arabian Nights pre-wedding theme party at Dublin; from stand up comedians and Rajasthan dol players for a mehendi party in Tamil Nadu’s hinterland Kanur to accompanying Ms. Aruna Sayeeram for a wedding concert held at a twenty five square feet pandal at the palace grounds in Bangalore, if truly has been an exciting journey.
Our wedding planning services are especially beneficial to NRIs who want their children to experience a traditional wedding with all its trappings but with the formality and precision expected of their western up-bringing. We have had occasions where we have exchanged all plans through mails over months and the family lands in Chennai just a week before the wedding. We generally indulge their preferences from oil free murukkus to adopting a baby elephant on the session of their wedding.
Not just weddings even thread ceremonies and Golden wedding anniversaries are all conducted today with aplomb and style. For some wedding anniversaries where children have wanted to surprise their parents, we have produced short films for them about the couple, tracing their life story interspersed with interesting anecdotes narrated by friends and relatives.
There goes a famous Tamil that states “Kalyaanam Panni Paaru” but in today’s parlance with an event planner at hand this is no more than a daunting task.
Read from a daily news paper.
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