Everything you need to know about the ‘Big Fat Indian Wedding’ in 2020

7 min read

If you are an Indian, then you must have heard the phrase “The Big Fat Indian Wedding”. You must have even attended a few. Indian weddings are fun, extravagant, bustling with excitement, and crazy to say to the least. There are laughter and music everywhere, delicious food to gorge on, kids playing around making a ruckus, and the older guests huddled together, glass in hand, having a blast. The atmosphere that is created is unique to Indians and is not really found in weddings in other parts of the world. It is almost like Diwali, Christmas, and Eid is being celebrated together.

The preparations for the Big Fat Indian wedding begin months in advance. In an Indian wedding, the entire family is involved and has a role and responsibility to play. A Big Fat Indian Wedding can be viewed more like a glitzy event rather than a union of couples. One might say that weddings need not be this extravagant, and it is actually just a show of power, wealth, and position among the affluent class of Indian society. However, when we view this with a more positive perspective, the Big Fat Indian Wedding is a glamorous take on an age-old tradition, an expression of the strength of old and new bonds, and a celebration of a lifetime of love.

“Once in a lifetime, amidst all the ordinary, life will give you a fairytale, we call it the Big Fat Indian Wedding”

How much is too much when it comes to an Indian wedding?

Honestly, the sky is the limit. The Big Fat Indian Wedding is characterized by its fusion of Western and Indian wedding experience. While on one hand, traditional ceremonies and rituals that are family-centric are the life and essence of an Indian wedding, contemporary events like pre-wedding photo shoots, cocktail parties, bachelorettes and lavish receptions are gaining importance and acceptance. You can best witness the mix of Indian and western ideas when it comes to the food options at an Indian wedding. You can find every cuisine displayed at the food counters, from North Indian, Italian, Chinese, Mediterranean, and Japanese. You know the wedding is grand when there are five different variants of the same dish, now that’s quite a feast for the foodie Indian.

When you enter a big fat Indian wedding, you will almost feel like you are on the sets of one of those big-budget Yashraj movies. The venue, which is usually a posh farmhouse or exotic resort, is decorated beautifully with chandeliers; satin drapes exotic flowers and beautifully patterned seating arrangement.

Another glaring characteristic of a Big Fat Indian Wedding is the hiring of professional help to plan and execute the wedding. From printing wedding invitations, assisting the bride and groom, to co-ordinating among the vendors and guiding the decorators, all the major and minor details of a wedding take place under the able leadership of wedding planners and event organizers. Earlier, weddings were a private affair, and family members handled all the wedding preparations among themselves. With the trend of hiring wedding planners becoming common among the elite and affluent, family members have no greater role to play than to look their best. Wedding planners ensure that their experience and networks get the wedding done in the best possible manner. A wedding planner is almost treated like a family member, and all-important wedding-related decisions are taken post consultation with them.

The Big Fat Indian Wedding is an experience in itself, where funds and efforts are put into creating a spectacle, which will be remembered for years to come. The pre-wedding photoshoot is conceptualized just like a movie trailer. The journey starts with the invitation cards itself. Paper invitations, however, are a thing of the past. We have moved on to luxurious invitations, accompanied by personalized gifts. Online wedding invites and wedding websites dedicated solely to the couple are in vogue and a great way to keep the guests involved in important details pertaining to the wedding.

A new startup called The Wedsite Company can take care of your wedding website needs like:
• the event details,
• wedding date & time,
• venue location & navigation,
• include a paragraph or two of the bride and the groom,
• put an option for their guests to write messages for the new couple,
• accept RSVPs and customized responses of the guests,
• exhibit their pre-wedding shoot pictures, &
• to showcase your wedding pictures post-wedding.

The biggest addition in the modern Big Fat Indian Wedding is the thrill of GOING LIVE on their wedding website and it’s slowly and steadily becoming a trend amongst the contemporary Indian family.

A destination wedding is almost synonymous with the Big Fat Indian wedding. Top picks among couples are heritage palaces of Jodhpur, Jaipur, and Udaipur. Internationally, Venice, Greece, and Italy claim the highest bid.

How exactly do you measure the glitz and glamour of an Indian wedding? By the wedding trousseau of course! With designers launching new bridal wear collections each year, the bride and groom along with everyone present is dressed head to toe in designer attire. Alia Bhatt’s obsession with getting married in Manish Malhotra’s designer lehenga in the movie Badrinath ki Dulhania is proof of how deeply entrenched this trend is in India. The entire attitude of ‘you only marry once’, has propelled Indian families to go all-in with the attire, jewelry, and gifts, not caring much about the whopping costs.

A Big Fat Indian Wedding gets its heat by the kind of guests that are invited. Big names in the political and business spheres grace the occasion and the wedding acts as a site for the mingling of the influential and famous. The guest list is made very carefully and the more the people that attend the wedding, grander the success. No stone is left unturned to please the guests, even though making everyone happy is almost impossible.

(Asia’s richest person, Mukesh Ambani (extreme right) on his daughter’s wedding.)

In a Big Fat Indian wedding, nothing is done in moderation. You either go all out or completely ignore it. The wedding begins to look like a project that must be completed efficiently and in time. It is seen that due to the magnanimity of the event, the large number of guests that need to be attended to, and the overall overwhelming feeling of getting married, the bride and the groom have the least fun at their own wedding.

The simplicity and austerity in organizing the different ceremonies at the wedding are somewhere lost and a wedding is now judged based on how larger than life it was. Be it a lehenga worth lakhs, an aerial doli, a stage set up for sangeet ceremony, celebrities invited to perform at the wedding resplendent with background dancers, a wedding in India is much than just a union of souls.

Hey there! Thanks for reading on till the end. We at TWC take great pride in the wedding websites we make and we’re waiting for you/your friend to reach out to us for a wedding website. Our BROADCAST LIVE feature is a great treat for your guests who are unable to come to your wedding.

You can reach out to TWC on +91 9903981525. Or visit us at www.thewedsitecompany.com

We’d love for you to take a moment out to follow us on our social media too: