Pooja Moolchandani and Kunal Ramchandani – Udaipur, Rajasthan
Kunal writes about how he met Pooja on Twitter, and their grand destination wedding across different properties in the city of Lakes.
It was a tweet from Pooja’s cousin and my close friend that got me introduced to Pooja. From our Twitter profiles, we found out that we both worked in similar industries (Pooja was working in online marketing, and I was working in Digital Analytics) and we ‘followed’ each other. Pooja was in India at the time, and I was in London. Conversations became regular, and happened at all digital platforms- Social Media, BBM etc. It was not until Pooja moved to London for a new job that we actually fell for each other.
Udaipur Wedding
We were both clear about one thing- that we wanted a destination wedding in India. So obviously Udaipur was the first city that came to our mind. While Pooja had visited Udaipur I had only heard lovely things about the city. We had to visit the town ourselves to see if it was the place for us. And once we visited the place, we were sold on the idea! The people are so friendly, the venues beautiful and the distances between the airport, railway station and venues make it all operationally convenient!
The beauty and serenity of Udaipur was captivating. We wanted to give our families and friends an experience of a lifetime and a taste of the royal India! Some of the locations we chose were palaces, which were no less than architectural splendors.
Venues: Different Hotels
We visited almost every venue in Udaipur including HRH Group of Hotels (Jagmandir Island Palace, Zenana Mahal, Manek Chowk, Durbar Hall), The Oberoi Udaivilas, Trident, Swaroop Vilas, Sheraton Palace, Taj Lake Palace and Fateh Garh. After which we kept the following in mind:
- – Exclusive access to the main function areas around the hotel (both indoors and outdoors).
- – Accessibility for elderly guests
- – Food- We had the pleasure of doing lots of food tasting. The variety at the HRH group of hotels in particular was unbelievable.
We finally chose Jagmandir (HRH) for our Wedding Ceremony and Reception, Zenana Mahal (City Palace Complex) for the Sangeet, Swaroop Vilas for the Mehndi and Trident for the Engagement.
Wedding Functions
The wedding took place at Jagmandir, a stunning palace located in the middle of Lake Pichola, and accessible only by a boat- we wanted our guests to experience and enjoy that. We had a fluid set-up that enabled our guests to enjoy the wedding, the food and wander around to enjoy the island palace.
The theme for the Engagement was ‘Qawalli’ while the theme for the Mehndi was ‘Rajasthani’ where the bridesmaids were dressed in bandhej sarees. The live lac bangle makers were a super hit, together with the decor of Rajasthani puppets and traditional drapes. The theme for the Sangeet was Bollywood.
The Wedding Makers
Unfortunately we had a terrible time with the Wedding Planner, so we ended up doing pretty much everything on our own. It is extremely hard to manage all aspects of an Indian wedding in India without a planner, but thanks to a lot of support from family members we managed.
Some of the other people we worked with, who were fabulous:
- – Cinematography team – Rishi Ekbote, Debasis Rout and Regan Raj, who put together an amazing trailer (please watch in full HD to fully enjoy!)
- – Our photographers Snigdha Sheel and Vinayak Das (Photo Tantra) need no introduction, they were a pleasure to work with and produced absolutely stunning photos.
- – The hotel staff were extremely cooperative- The Trident Hotel, led by Dhiraj Mehta and his team, were the most positive, friendly and capable people we’ve ever come across; Dashrath Singh Rathore of HRH Group of Hotels personally oversaw every aspect of our sangeet and wedding- he made sure we had a wedding we could only dream of.
- – The light and sound was handled by Mega Sound- they are hugely popular in Udaipur. We also highly recommend our DJ for the night, DJ Kavesh!
- – Our make-up artist Saba Sayed (from Mumbai) was beyond wonderful. She understood exactly what Pooja wanted and gave her a different look for each function.
Our honeymoon began at one of the most beautiful hotels in Asia – Udaivilas. The rooms, the views and the elegance were unparalleled. A million memories are with us. Udaipur will always be our favorite city, and we will always remember the amazing people of the city.
Photographs Courtesy– http://www.phototantra.com/
