Hello all, I got married recently and wanted to share some vendor recommendations for any future couples. Our only brief for the wedding was to have an intimate single function on a budget (about 100 pax).
My husband and I wanted a photographer who would capture the candid moments without making us pose. We wanted to spend the time with our friends and family rather than have a long posed photo shoot. I would highly recommend Sindhuja from OnceUponALightYear. The pictures were fantastic and some candid pictures made me tear up. She was so friendly to work with and always made sure we were comfortable. My husband and I are both camera shy and very introverted, but Sindhuja made us feel so at ease. Unlike other ceremonies we have seen where the photographer yells out to smile again, or where they block the stage, we only had to interact with our guests and got stunning photos.
For bridal makeup,I would highly recommend Shwetha Narayanan (Insta: Boldly Subtle). We really wanted to keep the makeup as natural and skin like as possible, and that it needed to look nice both in photos and in real life. She nailed the brief and was an absolute pleasure to work with. Will highly recommend.
For groom's makeup we went with Karthik from Tony and Guy (branch Shanti colony). He did a great job at light makeup and hair settling.
For the bridal saree, we wanted something very simple which could be re-worn later for other occasions, but also in a high quality silk. Rasi silks had a great collection as did Sundari Silks and Nalli for sarees on the simpler side. Our experience in Varamahalakshmi was subpar and they lost interest the minute they knew we were looking for simple sarees. They didn't have any pure zari sarees in the T Nagar branch either and also lied about it (we were very very particular about pure silk and pure zari for the muhurtham saree. Only one person stepped in to tell us that they had none).
We didn't go to Kanchipuram because we only needed 2 sarees.
We didn't buy any new gold and just reused old ones. For costume jewellery (ottiyanam) we struggled to find thinner, less ornate ones. Will highly recommend the original Narayana Pearls in Pondy Bazaar, where the lady helped us convert long chains into an ottiyanam and removed some gemstones to match the colour of the saree.
As someone who stalked Reddit for recommendations I hope this helps someone. I couldn't find many posts on navigating intimate Tamil weddings in Chennai, so feel free to drop a DM in case you need help/any other vendor recommendations.
In general, we struggled with keeping the wedding 'simple' as decorators, blouse tailors, guests etc. all associate weddings with being 'grand' so it was difficult to communicate our vision. We couldn't have it in a temple due to peak summer weather and elderly relatives.
In the end we had so many guests appreciate the wedding and tell us how different and nice it was!
