BENGALURU : Beyond its already-accepted perception of being the IT City or the Garden City, Bengaluru is starting to don a new attire: a wedding gown. The city, with people travelling in from various parts of India, has been increasingly becoming a population spot for destination weddings lately.
Bengaluru-based wedding planner and owner of Neferrtiti Weddings, Mahendra Gangadharan, has an idea why it is so. “This city is turning out to be a destination now. With easy connectivity and pleasant weather most of the year, many couples from other cities are opting to come to Bengaluru to have their marital processions. Destination weddings are becoming more and more popular.
While many couples from outside are coming to the city, many Bengalureans are choosing to look at beach properties and new locations in other parts of the country to have their wedding in the upcoming summer season,” he shares.
Agreeing with Gangadharan, Ivy Emmanuel, director of Unicorn Weddings Bangalore, believes that with the summer season right around the corner, folks are opting to have their special day in an outdoor setting. “Many couples are not preferring to go with banquet halls and want to have their special day in an intimate open-air setting, or a farmhouse or lawn wedding style,” says Emmanuel.
The city has truly welcomed its emerging identity of being a wedding hotspot. Incidentally, a recent report has been circulating on the internet, which through research and analysis, has quantified that Bengaluru saw the second-highest number of weddings (after Delhi) across all cities in India in the past year.
City-based Rashida Abuwalla, founder of I Do! Weddings & Occasions, feels it is because, in 2022, most events finally stepped out of the Covid bubble and on the live stage. “As the lockdown lifted and families resumed their everyday lives last year, the wedding industry took off in the most unforeseen manner. With thousands of couples who had been deferring their nuptial celebrations in the hope of a post-Covid grand wedding bash, and with many others who had previously concluded their celebrations in an intimate set-up during the lockdown but then saw it fit to celebrate lavishly,” shares Abuwalla.
Emmanuel believes that celebrity weddings have also influenced the general public. “Many couples were inspired by the celebrity wedding formats where they take people outside and have a smaller group in attendance, making it more personalised. When I speak to brides and grooms, they have given references to high-profile weddings from the setting to the decor,” she says.
City’s Shaziya Taj, who tied the knot last year, also noticed the sudden surge in weddings in the city. “I felt like my entire Instagram feed was filled with wedding content throughout 2022. The main reason for the rise is that many weddings got delayed during the pandemic. In my case, I had two pre-wedding events, the wedding day and the reception. We had different themes for each event and it was executed as I had imagined. The pre and post-ceremonies were pretty intimate with my close friends and family, but we had an elaborate wedding ceremony,” she concludes.