Aishwarya Parameshwaran and Akshit Bhatia, Holiday Inn Mumbai International Airport, Mumbai
A 2-states wedding that combined high-octane festivities with tender traditions.
From sharing coffee at work to sharing their lives forever, Seattle-based Tech professionals Aishwarya Parameshwaran and Akshit Bhatia’s journey is a special one. In a celebration that honored their love and connection, as well as their differences in culture, they tied the knot at the Holiday Inn Mumbai International Airport. Watch it all unfold.
How they met
Aishwarya shares, “We met on a shared cab ride to work in Seattle. We didn’t have a conversation when it happened at first. But unexpectedly, the next day it happened again, and the next, and the next! At some point, we figured we would rather talk than sit next to each other awkwardly for 15 minutes yet again. We soon started meeting over post-lunch coffee dates at work, which turned into dinners. Our first date was at a sushi restaurant, where we spent hours talking until the staff kicked us out! Over the next few years, we bonded over our shared love for music, food, and gaming, and the rest is history.”
Wedding Venue
“Our families have lived in Mumbai forever, and we were both raised in this city and have grown to love it over the years. We wanted a great venue in the city where we could celebrate our love for each other. And things just fell into place for us once we settled on Holiday Inn Mumbai International Airport. Nestled in the heart of the city, it offered us the perfect blend of comfort and luxury, with end-to-end services to help us flawlessly plan the wedding”.
Wedding Planning
The festivities were orchestrated by the event management team of Hilton Mumbai International Airport. The couple entrusted the team of Heart and Craft to capture every last moment of their celebrations.
Wedding Functions
Mehndi and Haldi
The bride shares, “Since Akshit is from the north and I am from the far south, we wanted to create our version of a “two states” wedding where our families and friends could come together and experience both cultures. We kept the mehendi events small and decided to kick the wedding festivities off with the Punjabi tradition of welcoming the bride and groom into each other’s families. This was followed by a haldi where everyone had a blast showering us with haldi and flowers”.
Sangeet
Aishwarya shares, “Sangeet was probably the highlight of the entire wedding for us. The funny part was that while proposing to me in May of 2021, Akshit actually had a whole speech prepared and completely blanked out at the moment. He made up for it at the Sangeet with the most heartwarming toast to us that blew me away.” Instead of watching their friends perform, the bride and groom were front and center of the stage, with the bride dazzling with her voice and her moves, and the groom with his skills of the guitar and the drums.
Wedding
The couple followed the incredibly fun night with a fusion Tamil-Punjabi wedding the next morning. Akshit arrived with a boisterous baraat wearing a stunning sherwani in true Punjabi fashion, before changing into a silk Mundu to embrace the bride’s Tamil heritage. Aishwarya looked enchanting as she entered in a striking red and gold kanjivaram saree. The floral mandap incorporated pastel blooms and banana leaves for a setup that honored both their cultures, as they took their first steps towards their married life.
Advice for couples
“The only advice we would like to give couples is that wedding planning can be chaotic and stressful. As hard as it might seem, just try and have fun with it. It is, at the end of the day, a celebration of your love for each other. It is easy to get caught up in the stress of it all, and things rarely work out exactly the way you want them to. But when you look back, you will always have a beautiful memory that you’ll cherish for the rest of your lives. We made a conscious effort to focus on ourselves whenever we could and keep things exciting for the two of us. It all worked out for us in the end!”
The Wedding Makers
Venue: Holiday Inn Mumbai International Airport
Groom’s Outfits: Men’s Wearhouse (Sangeet), Manyavar (Wedding)
Bride’s Outfits: Raj Gharana (Sangeet), Nalli’s (Wedding)
Makeup: Divvya Shrigiriwar
Photography and Videography: Heart and Craft
