DUBEY-VOHRA
Creating A Whole New World Together
Varun Dubey and Sanna Vohra grew up on the same street and went to the same elementary school but only reconnected at the age of 24. “It’s quite crazy how we didn’t cross paths for so long,” says Sanna. “When we did meet we were just friends for about a year, and it was only when he went to the UK for 3 months that he realized that he wanted to date me.” According to her, it took Varun a month to convince her of his intentions. “I am so glad he succeeded,” she says.
The couple was together for four years before they got married. Varun proposed at the Taj Mahal Hotel in Mumbai for a birthday staycation, and Sanna remembers he feigned a stomachache, leaving her to check in alone. “When I entered the suite, he had decorated it with photos, candles, and flowers and played a video he made himself of our journey together, which was equal parts sweet and hilarious,” she says. “My sister hid behind a curtain and took photos, and my family flew down to surprise me!”
The wedding took place at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in Goa, India, with guests flying in from over 10 countries. The three-day celebration was comprised of many North Indian wedding traditions, like a mehendi (where the bride and women put henna on their hands), the sangeet (a night of song and dance), the haldi/chooda (where the bride and groom get ready for the wedding), the wedding ceremony itself, and a more formal reception. There was also a reception in Delhi.
While most Indian brides wear red, Sanna’s wedding lehenga by Sabayasachi was ivory with large floral motifs. “This was quite an unconventional choice,” she says. For the mehendi, another unconventional choice was a playsuit and cape. Her reception gown was by Shriya Som, with other outfits by Falguni Shane Peacock, Bhumika Sharma, and Kresha Bajaj.
Sanna’s main business is a wedding website called The Wedding Brigade, which means she used her own team and services to book the venue, photographer, make-up artist, entertainment, and more. “Being the founder of The Wedding Brigade made my wedding planning process significantly easier—in fact, I just took one day off before the wedding!” she says. “I used our free concierge service to help me book my venue, photographer, and all other vendors far in advance, and I bought all of the small accessories I needed through our e-commerce portal. It allowed me to focus on the bigger decisions and enjoy the process more.”
Sanna says that while most Indian weddings tend to have a theme for each event, she wanted an overarching idea that could tie the whole wedding together. “I wanted the wedding to reflect Varun and I, and welcome people to our ʻworldʼ,” she says. Combining their diverse interests (“Lord of the Rings, Manchester United, start-ups, dogs, Dragon Ball, Tennis, the ocean”) proved to be a challenge, but as Sanna says, “A wedding is not only the joining of two worlds, but the creation of a new one.” She thought about how each element of the world (the sea, the night sky, etc) could be used to represent the different parts of her’s and Varun’s life coming together to create a new world. “These elements are reflected in our invite and also in the décor of each event,” says Sanna. “We really tried to make sure that our interests shone through in each aspect of the wedding.”