Karishma Patel and Mahesh Popat had known of each other for almost a decade before they actually started talking. Mahesh, a cosmetic dentist and international kabaddi player, was based in Manchester, while Karishma was a chartered accountant and model in London. They had crossed paths through mutual friends over the years but never really got to know each other.
That changed during the Covid-19 pandemic, when Karishma slid into Mahesh’s DMs after he shared a picture of some horses on an Instagram story. “I replied to his story, and I was like, ‘Where are you seeing these horses?’ Because everything was shut down in London. He explained he was in Manchester. We started talking, and then we never really stopped,” she recalls. Neither thought much of it at first; they assumed they were chatting as friends. But their messages became increasingly frequent, and before long it was clear there was something more there.
As the world began to reopen, Mahesh happened to visit London for work, and the two finally went on their first date to Holland Park. With restaurants open for business still few and far between, lunch was a burrito from a hole-in-the-wall spot nearby. “We sat on the side of the pavement and shared the burrito. We just walked around the city, and I showed him all the sights because he hadn’t been in a long time,” says Karishma.
Four years into their relationship, Mahesh proposed in Sri Lanka. Below, the couple takes us inside their three-day-long celebration at Hotel Villa Soligo and Castello San Salvatore in the Venetian countryside.
A sunset proposal in Sri Lanka
Mahesh: I knew Karishma wanted an oval ring with a gold band. Once I got the ring, I spoke with her dad to get his blessing. Karishma was away in Sri Lanka, so I surprised her out there.
Karishma: We were staying at Amanwella. It had been raining all day and I really didn’t want to go to the beach. But Mahesh had said that he’d booked a dinner and I had a really nice dress that I wanted to wear, so I agreed.
Mahesh: When we got to the beach it was almost empty. There was only one other couple there, which was the photographer and his wife. But Karishma obviously didn’t know that. The photographer was pretending to take pictures of his wife, and I was like, “Oh, Karishma, why don’t you go stand there? I’ll take a picture of you. That’s a good spot.”
Karishma: I was like, “This poor guy’s taking pictures of his girlfriend and I’m going to be in his shot.” But Mahesh kept insisting, because it looked so pretty.
Mahesh: I was pretending to take pictures of her and I said, “Why don’t you look out that way against the water?” And then as she looked away, I went down on one knee, and the photographer was ready to take the shot.
Karishma: The rain had stopped as well. The sky was a nice peach colour. It was a very peaceful dinner with the sound of the waves.
A Gujarati wedding in an Italian castle
Karishma: We enjoyed our engagement for a couple of months, and then in the summer of 2025 we had our Gujarati ceremony with close friends and family at a temple in London. We knew we wanted to do a destination wedding but weren’t sure where. Finally, we settled on Italy. A lot of our family would have found it easy to get there and it felt romantic. It still took us seven months to find our venue, though.
In the end, we found a beautiful castle on the outskirts of Venice—Castello San Salvatore. We actually booked it without seeing it, because we loved it so much. We did a traditional Gujarati Hindu ceremony in Italy as well, with a guest list of around 140 people.
We did all four events outdoors, which everyone said was risky because it might rain, but it ended up being a great decision. When you’re doing a destination wedding, you want people to feel like they’re on holiday and outside, not in a room that could be anywhere in the world.
Mahesh: Each part of the castle and our hotel, Villa Soligo, was just so scenically varied that it made each event feel completely different. We kept the decoration minimal, because the nature around us was so beautiful.
Karishma: I asked the florist to use seasonal flowers and colours, because she was local to that region. Even food-wise, our caterer was Indian but had been based in Italy for the last 10 years. So, we asked him to do Italian fusion food. For the sangeet night, we wanted to remake classic cocktails with a twist. We did a masala negroni sbagliato and a lychee bellini. We did as much as we could to bring the two cultures together.
Bringing a piece of Mumbai to Italy
Karishma: My dad grew up in Matunga in Mumbai, and I’d never really been there before. So, when we went to Mumbai, I made sure I went and saw where he grew up. We saw the house he’d grown up in, and just outside there’s a bazaar with wedding stuff. I decided to get as much decoration and flowers from there as possible. I just thought that the fact that my dad would have walked by this road 50 years ago and not realised I’d be here all this time later, picking things up for my wedding, was incredibly special.
The flowers I got from there were artificial or dried, of course. I wore fabric flowers to the haldi, which I designed with artisans at this little studio in Mumbai. We made fabric gajras for the guests to take home.
Dhoklas, dance-offs, and dolce vita
Mahesh: When everyone arrived on the first day, we had a last-minute welcome party with fresh wood-fired pizza, beer and wine, and Italian music. They even let us do some cooking, so Karishma and I made a pizza together.
