After considering other destinations, Shivani Pancholi and Shantanu Garg decided on a wedding in New Delhi. They wanted ageing relatives to be there without the strain of travel, and they wanted the celebration to feel close to home in every sense. Pancholi had long imagined an outdoor ceremony with greenery, winter sun and a mandap by the water. When they walked into The Roseate, the search ended there.
There was no planner. Instead, both families handled the details together, from the décor and wedding baskets to the party favours and hampers. Pancholi describes the process as part of the memory of the wedding itself. “Everything was self-curated and managed by both our families,” she says. “It was all a reflection of us, shaped by the people closest to us.”
Pancholi and Garg wanted to honour both their roots, leaning into reds, maroons and golds across the wardrobe and décor while keeping the ceremonies traditional in spirit. Fresh flowers, diyas, kalava and mauli appeared throughout, and they made a point of preserving the more sacred aspects of the rituals. Their priest explained the purpose of each mantra in detail, and they also planned what Pancholi describes as a particularly playful joota chupai.
Before the formal functions began, there had already been dance practices, family get-togethers and dhol nights.
Both Pancholi and Garg were born and raised in New Delhi. They had spent enough time in the same social orbit for the eventual meeting to feel almost overdue. Pancholi describes it as an invisible string theory kind of story. They were often at the same parties and in the same circles before finally meeting properly at a mutual friend’s Diwali party.
They were together for about a year and a half before they got married, though the relationship had already been built on friendship first. They travelled together, got to know one another’s families and, in Pancholi’s telling, moved towards the wedding with very little friction. “Everything happened and blended very easily,” she says. “Almost as if everything led up to this very moment, and puzzle pieces fell right into place.”
The proposal was not one neat cinematic moment. Garg first proposed during an intimate night at home, with just the two of them there. They told their families that same night–”They didn’t believe us for a solid minute, says Garg–then held a small roka with only immediate family. Later, Garg got down on one knee again on the way to a surprise getaway he had planned for them.
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