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Planning a wedding is an art of its own, and an elaborate affair which usually takes months. But planning a wedding during a pandemic? “Very tough, and you have to be willing to do everything yourself,” says Amina Nalakath, as she begins to narrate the “fun” she had planning her lockdown wedding over several weeks. Who says that a small and warm wedding at home cannot be your ‘dream wedding’?
While the lockdown ruined the wedding plans of many couples, Amina, her husband and their families refused to delay the wedding and pulled off a complete Do-It-Yourself (DIY) wedding. And the one advice she has for you if you plan to get married soon – be prepared to get your hands dirty. “I had a ton of work and planning to do. I still had fun, but it wasn’t easy,” Amina says with a chuckle.
Hailing from Kerala’s Malappuram, the 27-year-old, her mother, aunts and cousins executed an intimate three-day wedding with four events – Sangeet, Mehendi, Haldi and Nikkah – all by themselves. This included setting up their own decor for the stage, homecooked food for the guests and DIY outfits for the bride. Amina also repurposed her grandmother and mother’s antique jewellery and shawls to complete her look for the Sangeet. The wedding was held at Amina’s 150-year-old ancestral home in Malappuram’s Tirur.
Jewellery makes up a big part of the bridal look. For her Mehendi ceremony, Amina wore a bright red and gold lehenga with a green dupatta, which she paired with her cousin’s silver hand-me-down jewellery.
“The choker and danglers are pure silver. They are about 20-21 years old and my cousin had been using them. All I had to do was get them polished before wearing them. They matched very well with my outfit,” she says.
For the Sangeet night, the bride decided to go traditional with a deep green blouse, a crimson thattam or headscarf that she fashioned out of her mother’s 20-year-old dupatta and a white mundu. Along with this, Amina paired her family’s antique jewellery hand-me-downs.
“I wore my grandmother’s gold jhumkas which are very old. The second chain I’m wearing is what my mother gifted me in my teens. The first one is a beautiful choker gifted by my mother-in-law. The third one is a variation of the Kasu mala (or coin necklace) but with dollars. And the fourth piece is the saree mala, a layered gold chain with intricate work,” Amina adds.
On the day of her wedding and Bidai, where she left to her husband’s place, the bride stuck to jewellery bought from outside. “I got new jewellery but with traditional patterns. This I wore when I left for my in-laws’ place,” she says.
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Her red and gold wedding lehenga was designed and stitched in Bengaluru, with which she paired jewellery she had purchased. Additionally, most of her make-up was DIY. “I had to watch YouTube tutorials to get the foundation and contouring right. For the wedding day, I hired a make-up artist and went to a family friend’s house to get dressed,” she says.
Along with her cousins, the bride herself set up the stage, wooden seating, decor and lighting for all of the festivities.
“We couldn’t get event planners. So, I took a few of my father’s Kasavu Mundu (veshti) and tied them together to form a white backdrop for the stage. My cousins and I also got colour paper from local stores and cut them up into tiny patterns and stuck them to the white mundu. This was basically our stage backdrop,” Amina explains.
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The family used pai or traditional mats made out palm trees and long grass and spread them on the floor. “My ancestral house has a lot of old and heavy furniture. We got plenty of these benches and decided to use them,” she adds. For the Haldi ceremony on the morning of May 30, the family kept it simple yet vibrant by arranging tables in the lawn and hanging colourful bangles on the trees.
“I had a lot of bangles that I’d been collecting since school. We bunched them up and put them on tree branches. We kept bowls and put coloured bangles in them. I also wore a not-so-expensive yellow sharara for this ceremony as it would be ruined with haldi,” she adds.
Hailing from a Malabar Muslim family, Amina wanted traditional Muslim festivities with all the contemporary elements of a wedding. These were held before the Nikkah, which was held at her Tirur residence on June 1.
“Some of these typically Moplah ceremonies include an Ari-Kuthu Kalyanam or rice wedding and a rathri Kalyanam – which is like the Sangeet. These functions usually have women singing and dancing the ‘Oppana’ while wearing the traditional Mundu, blouse and thattam (head scarf) outfit. I wanted them for my wedding,” Amina says.
An Ari Kuthu Kalyanam sees the bride pound rice using a stone mortar and pestle while the other women watch on. “This was to see if the new bride can cook or has skills required in the kitchen. It’s outdated now but the ceremony is still beautiful,” the bride adds. The 27-year-old clubbed her rice pounding wedding and Sangeet on the evening of May 31 which saw just close family and friends.
Amina also recalls a particularly challenging time when it suddenly started raining on the eve of the Sangeet and the stage decor bled colour on to the white backdrop. Since they had no other decor options, the bride and her mother had to wash the backdrop, dry it and set it up as decor the following day. “I barely got any sleep that day,” she recalls.
For Amina and her Dubai-based husband Mohammad’s Nikkah, the ceremony was held inside the bride’s ancestral home, in two separate rooms. “My brother couldn’t join as he was away and there was a ban on flights. So we streamed the Nikkah for all the loved ones who couldn’t make it. For our friends, we went live on Instagram after the wedding so they could greet me and my husband and see us in our wedding attire,” she adds.
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The bride’s aunts also got down to preparing the wedding menu, with specific tasks designated to each family member. “My husband has a huge sweet tooth. So one of my aunts was designated to make desserts. We made all kinds of desserts, be it puddings, halwa, rasmalai, rasgulla and other Indian sweets,” Amina says. The main course too was prepared by the family with a little help from their domestic worker.
Despite the many struggles, Amina says that the wedding was even more memorable as it was made possible with the effort of each and every family member.
“It was so much more personal as each and every aunt, uncle and cousin participated. My uncles turned videographers and recorded all the events. I took part in every bit of planning and decorating and yet had so much fun. That wouldn’t have happened if this was a regular wedding,” she points out.
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This article was produced in association with Kalyan Jewellers.