Set up by mutual friends, finance professionals Mousmi Sharma and Prithvi Reddy had a near-instant connection: “I knew by our second date that I was going to marry him,” Mousmi recalls of the couple’s 2015 dinner at Cafe Mogador in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. “In classic Prithvi fashion, he decided to combine a date with hanging out with his family,” she adds. “That night, I realized he just exudes goodness.”

About a year and a half later, the New York-based couple flew to Provence, France, for vacation, where, after hours of searching for the perfect picnic spot (and eventually trespassing on someone’s private farm), Prithvi pulled out a placeholder ring which he subsequently replaced—with input from his bride-to-be—for a classic engagement ring: a cushion-cut diamond with tapered baguettes set in platinum, which Mousmi later stacked with a ruby pavé ring and diamond wedding band.

After returning home, the pair called on wedding planners Kelly Clark Leonard and Cassidy Rae Rios to create their version of “a big Indian wedding.”

Although the planners had never executed such a fete, they pulled off the three-day affair replete with a welcome cocktail party, the traditional art of mehndi and sangeet (a pre-wedding celebration for the bride-to-be and her female relatives and friends), Bollywood-style dance performances and a Hindu ceremony at the Crossroads Estate in Los Olivos, Calif.

Two hundred guests from India, Brussels, London, Dubai, North Carolina and New York gathered to see the pair married by Mousmi’s 91-year-old grandfather, Ganga Dhar Sharma. “Many of the rites are done in Sanskrit,” she says. “He translated and kept everyone entertained with his ‘modified’ vows, which were definitely in my favor.”

After the “I do’s” and a first dance to Frankie Valli’s “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” the festivities continued, culminating in a 400-person grand finale of a reception months later in India. “It was a magical way to start our life together,” says Mousmi.

EVENT PRODUCTION Event of the Season RENTALS A Rental Connection ENTERTAINMENT de Bois Entertainment HAIR AND MAKEUP Brianna Stewart-Olcese VIDEOGRAPHY Mawwiage Films LIGHTING  Ambient Event Design HONEYMOON Seychelles

Photography by AMY AND STUART.
Written by ERICKA FRANKLIN.

This article originally appeared in the Spring 2018 issue of C Weddings.