Happy Wednesday, Maharanis! Today we're sharing a magnificent Indian fusion wedding planned by the amazing team at Bridal Arts and Events! This spectacular shaadi was held at the beautiful Glen Island Harbor Club, and featured ultra dazzling decor by Elegant Affairs Inc. and the most delicious food from Moghul Caterers! Our lovely Indian bride Nameeta was radiant in all her wedding outfits, and hair and makeup from SV Bridal Concepts by Sanjana Vaswani were the final touches that made her look unbelievably gorgeous! Joseph Minasi Weddings captured all the most tender moments from this incredible wedding in their wonderful highlight film below (we especially loved the Maharani's sister's speech at 3:22!), so check it out and enjoy every heartwarming moment!
Maharani Nameeta on meeting her Raja:
"It all started back in late summer of 2012 when my friend Nicole asked me if I wanted to join an annual wine tour she organizes with her then boyfriend (now husband!) Nemo. Although I was initially hesitant, I said yes once I got my friend Rachel to join me.
The morning of the grand event, September 15th – a day I will never forget, I left my apartment to help Nicole put all of the food items and champagne bottles from Nemo’s Stuytown pad into the coach bus they had hired. That was my first time meeting Nemo. After everything was successfully loaded, I hopped onto the bus, excited to see Long Island wine country for the first time.
Since everyone had pretty much separated into groups of 'Nicole’s friends' and 'Nemo’s friends' in the front and back of the bus respectively, I spent the entire ride going to Long Island getting to know the former group. I actually didn’t even see or talk to Chris until the 3rd winery at Baiting Hollow (also a horse rescue farm) where we briefly spoke for only a few minutes until I got distracted by a tour to visit the stables.
It was really only on our way back to the city that the real action happened. I was looking out my window while we were on the Long Island Expressway in the right lane and saw a car that was in the middle lane trying to cross over to catch an exit. The guy must have been a pretty bad driver because instead, he rammed right into the side of our bus. Although luckily nobody got hurt, we had to pull over and wait for the police to come.
In the approximately 1.5 hours that we were waiting, everyone stood up and started chatting. That's when Chris came up to me to start a conversation. I honestly had no idea he liked me but he seemed to be a fellow foodie (now I know that couldn't be further from the truth!) so we exchanged numbers so we could meet up to try out an ice cream place together.
The poor guy tried for 4 weeks after to get me to commit to a date to get the aforementioned ice cream, but because of my busy work schedule, I kept postponing. But persistence pays off! Chris texted me every day and one day he mentioned he was going to be running a race pretty soon. I wished him good luck and he said 'Thanks! I'll run the last quarter mile for you!' A light bulb finally went off and I determined that it would definitely be worth it to make some time for a date. The rest as they say is history."
On the romantic proposal:
"We got engaged in Paris in December 2014. Chris asked me to marry him on the Pont des Arts, also known as the Love Lock Bridge. He led me there, got down on one knee, and held out a lock with our initials on it that had a diamond ring locked onto it. With his other hand he presented me with a key and asked if I would unlock our future together. I was so nervous, I dropped the key and it landed between the two wooden slats, about to drop into the river below! Luckily, Chris was able to gingerly pick it up and unlock the ring to put on my finger after I happily accepted his proposal!"
On her bridal outfits:
"I wore three different dresses during my wedding weekend - one for the sangeet, one for the ceremony, and one for the reception. Because I knew I wanted all three to be very different, I got them all custom made in Mumbai, India specifically at the Aishwarya Design Studio and Panihari stores in Vile Parle. For my sangeet, I wanted a very vibrant, fun color so I went with a mint green anarkali with antique gold embroidery. For the ceremony, my decor was based on a regal 'temple' setting that I wanted to match but also incorporate a bit of modernity and lightness, so I chose to wear a bright red-orange lehenga instead of pure dark red. For the reception, I wanted to add an element of fusion since this was a mixed wedding so for this event I chose a pink and navy blue fusion gown that had a Indo-western jacket style top with a net overlay bottom layered on top of a full skirt."
On the most magical moments of the wedding:
"There are two moments that really stand out for me. One, I had commissioned for Chris a special groom's cake that looked exactly like a Bloomberg terminal since he is a complete finance geek. I even personalized the screens to reflect actual Bloomberg stock price charts he had made for me and had fondant post-its written with special messages. After we cut our wedding cake, the DJ announced that there was something else. When they rolled the groom's cake out, the look on Chris's face was priceless. He loved it and that made it totally worth it.
The second moment was during our ceremony when we played a game where you have to find a ring in a pot of rosewater. The priest announced that whoever found the ring would be the dominant person of the household and then asked all the guests who they thought would win. Everyone started chanting 'Nameeta! Nameeta!' and I felt so much amazing energy in the room. And of course 5 minutes later I triumphantly held up the ring I found first."
On the special details:
"We both love elephants so we had an elephant theme incorporated into various parts of our wedding. For example, our cake toppers were gold elephants whose trunks formed a heart, our invitations had a gold elephant border, we had two gold elephants at the front of the aisle leading to the mandap, and Indian elephant place card holders."
We hope you enjoyed this stunning shaadi as much as we did, Maharanis! Have a fantastic day! We'll be back with another sublime wedding tomorrow!
