Nishta Patel and Mihir Shah considered having a destination wedding—until they realized they had a destination right where they lived. The bride and her mother run Tarsadia Farms in Riverside, California, which has been in her family for three generations. “We were just like, ‘Wait. We have such a special farm. Why wouldn’t we do it where we’re based and share with our friends and family something that connected both of us?’” Nishta says. “[Mihir’s] dad has a background in farming. He has hundreds of fruit trees and hillside at their house. It’s something that connected both of us when we started dating.” It also felt like a chance for Nishta to show years of work to her inner circle.
It was the first wedding to be held at the farm, which meant the entire space had to be reimagined. “Everything was totally novel, [we] literally made that acre,” says Mihir, who is the principal and co-founder of the industrials-focused investment group Shah Capital Ventures. “I was there four days before and it was a tennis court. And then, I was like, ‘What the hell is this glass house? This is nuts!’”
When Nishta began planning, she asked herself, What’s something unexpected? “I’ve always wanted to build a small greenhouse on the farm, just to grow my seedlings in,” she says. “This was a vision of what life could become for us and the future. I’ve always dreamed of doing something like that, and finally it came true.” Read ahead for more, including her multiple Wiederhoeft looks, a cigar lounge, and the best strawberries.
The Indian Ceremony
Nishta and Mihir had their Indian ceremony on Thursday. “Typically, Indian weddings have three or four days of events, but I think we both have been to so many that we were just like, ‘We don’t want to do that,’” she says. Instead, the two opted for a more intimate gathering at home. While typically the bride and groom do things separately, they decided to do everything together. That consisted of an abbreviated version of all the rituals and conducting the ceremony after lunch. “It was perfect,” Nishta says. Adds Mihir: “And it made room for us to be stress-free for the rest of the weekend. Because at that point, we were technically married.”
The Welcome Party
On Friday, the couple welcomed all their guests with a party at Nishta’s father’s golf course. They saw it as a great opportunity for face time with everyone ahead of the wedding. “It was beautiful and not drawn-out,” Mihir says. “We had a cigar lounge, an outdoor area, and it was very tastefully done. Very nontraditional.”
The Outfits
Nishta, who has always loved fashion, saw her wedding as a unique opportunity to really have fun with what she wore. For her Indian ceremony, she chose a non-traditional sari that she could wear many times. And over the rest of the weekend, she wore Wiederhoeft. Having previously traveled to New York City with her bridal stylist, Tara Maietta, Nishta met with the designer who ended up creating a custom look in pink for her. “It turned out stunning and I was so happy with it,” she says. The dress had several components that could be added and taken off. “I took off layer after layer off made so many looks out of it,” Nishta adds. For the welcome party, she wore a gold gown by the designer. “I just felt so beautiful in it, and I don’t typically feel that way in dresses like that.”
For his part, Mihir wore a custom tuxedo from Klein Epstein Parker with Christian Louboutin shoes. “I went there a week before the wedding, tried it on, and was like, ‘All right. It fits. Okay.’ It was a non-issue,” he says. Both fathers and Mihir’s brother also got their outfits from Klein Epstein Parker.
The Wedding
Creating an event space on the farm required a great deal of retrofitting and the creation of structures. The work was so extensive that the couple themselves were surprised on the big day. “I tried my best to not look at anything the morning of the wedding, even when we did photos. Walking into the tent and just seeing all of it come to life [was] just so unreal to me. All of my dreams came to life,” Nishta says.
Mihir, who was admittedly less involved in the planning process, was even more astounded. “Walking into this venue that I did not even know was a possibility an hour before...I thought, Wow, this is going to be the most epic night,” he recalls.
At the cocktail hour, framed photos of the couple’s family members were on display. “It really felt like you were arriving at a dinner party at our home. It was an experience the whole way through,” Mihir says.
It meant so much to Nishta to have guests truly experience the work that she does on the farm. “One of Mihir’s mom’s best friends was picking strawberries and eating them, and she came to me and said, ‘These are the best strawberries.’ Having people experience what I planted and grew and seeing it just fill everyone up was very special,” she says.
“It was a dream wedding. It went off without a hitch, nothing was overdone, overproduced. It was great,” Mihir says. “Everybody said, ‘This is the greatest party.’”
Nishta Patel and Mihir Shah’s Wedding
Adrienne Gaffney is a features editor at ELLE and previously worked at WSJ Magazine and Vanity Fair.
