Simplistic Grace
Neha Kudalkar

By Jaspreet Soni

Neha and Dhairav had known each other for a very long time but it was only when they were in US, they realized that there was more to their relationship than just being friends. What followed was a beautiful wedding that culminated in Mumbai in December, 2011.

Being from a design background herself, Neha had a very clear idea about what she wanted to wear- a simple, elegant dress with interesting details.

Gaurav Gupta Cocktail Dress
Neha likes to wear deep colors. She says, "I love black but did not want to stick to the 'Oh! so usual' look. It was at a friend's store in Bandra, I saw this Gaurav Gupta dress that I instantly fell in love with. It was a beautiful aubergine knee length outfit with heavy embellishment on the neck. It fitted like a dream. I teamed it up with diamond jewelry and tried to keep the make-up minimal and natural."

Understated yet graceful Wedding Trousseau
One thing that stood out in Neha's wedding trousseau was the balance she was able create between being understated and the right amount of bling. Every element just gelled so well together. Neha says, "The whole outfit has been done from scratch. My good friend's mother, Nisha Shah designed it. I believe that you should work with someone who brings about an aspect that you will never be able to. And that's exactly what Nisha Aunty did with my wedding outfit. We started by buying the fabric. The crimson red lehenga was a beautiful weave like Banarasi work. I wanted to play with the auspicious colors so we teamed it up with gold blouse and stunning orange dupatta. The work on the skirt and dupatta was a combination of cutwork, zardosi and dori. I kept the dupatta light in terms of work because during the pheras I had to have a heavy gharcholu, the traditional gujarati drape, on me." She wore jadau antique finish heirloom jewelry and beautiful jasmine flowers in her hair. Priya Todarwal did her makeup.

Photographs courtesy: Payal Kumar
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