Aditi & Karan, Mussoorie

Aditi grew up in Dehradun and Karan's family is from Pune, and both wanted a wedding that felt like the hills Aditi had spent her summers in. The brief: three days in Mussoorie in April, 220 guests, a Garhwali-Maharashtrian blend of rituals and a mandap with the valley behind it. The heritage hill resort they chose had a lawn with exactly that view — and a single-lane access road, a 10 pm outdoor music curfew and 64 rooms for a guest list that needed 110.

We split the guests between the resort and a second property eight minutes away, with a shuttle every twenty minutes. Karan's family arrived by train and flight across two days, so our travel desk ran pickups from Dehradun station and Jolly Grant and staggered the climb up the hill. Décor trucks went up before 7 am to avoid tourist traffic. April evenings in Mussoorie drop to 10°C, so the sangeet moved into a glass-walled hall with heaters on standby.

The pheras were fixed for 4:40 pm. The mandap, built of marigold, pine and Pahari brass, faced west over the valley, and the ceremony finished as the light turned gold. A Garhwali dhol-damau group led the baraat, followed by a Maharashtrian lezim troupe that Karan's cousins had rehearsed with for a month.