How Millennials Ditched Big Fat Weddings

Modern Indian weddings are no longer just about scrumptious menus, flashy decors, and extravaganza events.
It's more about thoughtfulness, personalisation, and celebrating with loved ones, observes Anam Zubair, associate director of marketing, WeddingWire India.

As the world gains back to normalcy after two years into the pandemic, the 2022 summer wedding season looks really promising.

If we talk about the Indian wedding ecosystem, it's true that this pandemic has redefined the concept of a dream wedding.

Modern Indian weddings are no longer just about scrumptious menus, flashy decors, and extravaganza events. It's more about thoughtfulness, personalisation, and celebrating with loved ones.

Millennial couples have a huge role to play in redefining this new wave of Indian weddings.

Some of them are now opting for new-age wedding formats like shift weddings in which they are inviting people in batches, some are planning hybrid/intimate weddings, while a major chunk is waiting for the Covid wave to settle in to celebrate their wedding in the traditional loved big-fat Indian wedding format.

Their inclusive nature and thoughtfulness have transformed how weddings are perceived in India.

Adding to that, their convenience and comfort in opting for nature have opened gates for technological innovations.

Due to these factors, we've witnessed trends like weekend weddings, sustainable weddings, or even metaverse weddings pick up. I believe, 2022 will transform the wedding industry even further.

From an increase in personalised weddings to sustainable clothing, I've listed down some wedding trends picked up by couples:

Personalisations and customisations

Since the last decade, we've witnessed that personalisation has become pivotal to weddings.

With each passing day, the number of couples opting for personalised decor, hashtags, or rituals are increasing.

As we step into 2022, this is only going to increase further. Especially the hashtag trend.

It has been soaring in the social media-driven world and has almost become a wedding ritual these days.

On WeddingWire, we observed that queries for hashtags grew by a whooping 1,378% from 2019 to 2022.

WedTech driven weddings

Pandemic revolutionised the way Indians experience weddings and the process of wedding planning, with the rise of WedTech being at the core of this experience.

With WedTech, couples and families realised that they can do everything online at one place -- from selecting wedding invitations, and finalising mehendi wala to shortlisting venues, all at one place, which in turn made them realise that they can significantly reduce the time and effort required in the planning process.

This trend particularly picked up amongst young millennial couples.

As per an analysis done by WeddingWire India in 2020, there were around 250,000 to 300,000 couples in India using the Internet to find wedding vendors at that time.

During the pandemic, the number has only increased further.

Hybrid/New format weddings

Weddings, big or intimate, are once-in-a-lifetime celebrations.

However, in the last two years, the current choice seems to have shifted from big fat events to various smaller versions, from grand physical weddings to hybrid weddings, keeping everyone's safety as the utmost priority.

Hybrid weddings essentially combine in-person and virtual elements.

It helps couples and families follow the social distancing guidelines while organising the wedding of their dreams with their loved ones being present.

From setting up live streaming to having food delivered to guests who are attending remotely, weddings with a mix of in-person and virtual celebrations are currently in trend, we will witness some more of this trend in the near future as well.

Destination weddings in the vicinity

Destination weddings have become extremely popular over the past several years.

Some of the popular destinations for 2022 being Jaipur, Udaipur, Mussoorie, Agra and Lonavala.

In fact, an interesting trend we are noticing is of vicination weddings -- destination weddings in the vicinity.

It has witnessed a significant uptick since the pandemic.

The biggest driving factor is the imposed travel restrictions and safety precautions. For instance, a couple residing in Mumbai might opt for a wedding in Goa or Lonavala, similarly, a couple residing in Delhi might opt for a destination wedding in Rishikesh or Jaipur -- basically locations that can be easily travelled to.

Sustainable choices

When we talk about weddings, big-fat Indian celebrations this year, couples are keeping sustainability at the top of their priority list.

Millennial couples themselves become more conscious of their lifestyle choices and they also urge their families and friends to do so.

This year the priority on sustainable fashion is high as well and that’s not just for designers, but also for consumers.

This is redefining post-pandemic wedding fashion trends as there is a drastic shift in sartorial choices for the bride and groom.

Apart from fashion, sustainability is also changing a few other wedding trends slowly and gradually.

For instance, it is driving the demand for e-invites or seed paper invites and customised wedding Web sites and giving couples an option to limit paper consumption or reuse it sustainably.

Therefore, to avoid the relentless waste of plastic and paper that comes along with printed wedding invites, couples are increasingly opting for new-age wedding invites.

If the pandemic taught us anything, weddings aren't all about social obligations anymore -- they are now a time for celebrating the love you have for each other.

But that doesn't mean you can't get creative with it!

In India, weddings are nothing short of a mega festival with all the loved ones coming together, where one can explore many different moods and trends that only keep evolving for the better as the year passes by while also bringing along some new, modern aspects to it.