Natasha and Phil at Aldona, Goa

The Singapore based couple reveal (almost) all the secrets to their intimate destination wedding in Goa.

Our new series, ‘Featured Weddings’ brings you wonderful moments from weddings held at the finest venues across different cities. Here we feature Natasha and Phil’s wedding celebrations held across unique venues in Goa. The brides tells us more here.

How we met

Phil and I met six years ago when I crashed Phil’s birthday party at an awesome beach house in Gorai. Little did we know it would result in marriage! Phil is half Indian and half French- with some Italian heritage, born and raised in England. I’m entirely from Pune. We lived in London for a while before recently moving to Singapore to explore South East Asia. We’re fortunate to have jobs that take us to new countries for work because we also love to travel. Phil works in finance and I work with a social enterprise focused on leadership development and social impact.

Wedding Venue

We got married in Goa at the end of February. We always knew we would have a small, rustic wedding. For the venue, we were dead sure not to have it at a hotel and so the quest for an outdoor, green space that was non-commercial and natural began.

Kudos to Phil for his amazing research and initial recces- we locked down three venues without me seeing any in person! Working with independent small venues is definitely more challenging but totally worth it. I plan projects and big events for my day job. Planning a destination wedding just meant more spreadsheets, which I happily embraced!

Wedding Events

We had 120 guests in total, perfect for our three-day wedding. We had enough time to really talk to everyone and it was very relaxed. Our festivities kicked off with a sundowner cocktail party, held at Water’s overlooking the Vagator beach. The idea was to have a casual, very chilled welcome party. It was the perfect start.

On the second day, we had a Mehndi function with the best chaat by Chaat Street at Ishavilas in Siolim, North Goa.

Finally, the wedding itself was at a magical secret garden in Aldona, Goa.

I will keep this a secret and I really hope my photographer doesn’t spill the beans! It is a hidden gem and should remain that way unless you really search and strive to make it work for you!

Wedding Vendors

– Sunset Getaways planned the wedding- Blossom, Meryl, Lyndon and their team, were awesome.

– Ishavilas and the team there were outstanding– in addition to hosting our Mehndi ceremony, our families stayed here and they organized all our transport over three days.

– Aseen and Joe from L’Orange catered and the food was amazing.

– Elton Fernandez from Mumbai was my make-up artist – loved how natural he made me look.

– Chaat Street caterer – top notch dosas and street food!