Haldi, Mehendi and Sangeet Invitations: Ideas and Wording

The wedding card carries the weight of tradition. The cards for the days before it are allowed to smile.

Haldi, mehendi and sangeet are the most personal events in an Indian wedding. They are smaller, warmer and usually louder, and their invitations can be too. They are also where families often run out of time and send a plain text message instead. That is a shame, because a well made event card sets the mood, tells guests what to wear, and makes them feel properly asked.

Here are our ideas for each event, with sample wording you can borrow or adapt.

A few things that apply to all three

Before the event-by-event notes, some simple principles.

• Keep a family resemblance. The haldi, mehendi and sangeet cards do not need to match the wedding card exactly, but a shared palette or type style makes the whole celebration feel considered.
• One event per card. Combining three functions on one crowded card makes each feel smaller. Separate cards also let you send each one only to the guests invited.
• Say who is hosting. Haldi and mehendi are often held separately by each family, at each home. Make it clear whose event it is.
• Always add a dress code line. For these three events, guests want to know what to wear more than almost anything else.
• Put timings that are real. If the mehendi will run all afternoon, say so. Guests plan around it.

Haldi invitations

The haldi is bright, messy and full of laughter: turmeric paste applied by family and friends to bless the bride or groom before the wedding. Different traditions know it by different names. Marwari and Gujarati families often call it the pithi, many Bengali families the gaye holud, Maharashtrian families the halad, and in Punjabi homes it is part of the maiyan with vatna. If your family uses one of these words, put it on the card. It is a small detail that makes the invitation feel like yours.

Design ideas

Yellow is expected, but it does not need to be loud. Saffron, marigold and warm ivory, with a little brass or gold, feel celebratory without shouting. Motifs that suit a haldi card: marigolds, a brass urli, a katori of turmeric paste, mango leaves, a swing.

Seen hereUbtanHaldi invitation

Ubtan is built around the ritual itself. On a red and gold haldi chowki, a little brass spoon slowly stirs a katori of turmeric paste while the breeze carries marigold petals from a potted marigold into the bowl, where they settle and turn gold. For something more playful, Jhoola has two mynas sharing a marigold on a lacquered swing under a mango tree, and Snaan has a sparrow taking a splashing haldi bath in a brass urli. You can see them all in our haldi collection.

Sample wording

Warm and simple:

The haldi ceremony of Ishani and Aarav. Saturday, 18 April, 10 in the morning. The Kapoor Haveli, Jaipur.

Playful, with a dress code:

Come swing by and bring your brightest yellow. Dress code: any shade of sunshine, and clothes you can get a little yellow.

Hosted by the family:

With joy, the Kapoor family invites you to the haldi of our daughter Ishani, as we bless her with turmeric before her wedding.

In Hindi:

हल्दी की रस्म में आपकी उपस्थिति प्रार्थनीय है।

पीले रंग में रंगने ज़रूर आइए।

Haldi is usually held in the morning, so make the time clear and, if you can, mention whether a meal follows.

Mehendi invitations

The mehendi is the long, slow afternoon of the wedding week. Henna is applied, songs are sung, plates of food go round, and nobody is in a hurry. Its invitation should feel the same: relaxed, green and fragrant.

Design ideas

Henna leaves, a mehendi cone, fine vine patterns, jasmine strings, pomegranates and roses all sit naturally on a mehendi card. Greens work beautifully, from deep emerald to soft sage, with gold and a touch of rose.

Seen hereBelMehendi invitation · Marwari

Bel has a lovely moment in motion: two butterflies carry a mehendi cone between them, and its tip draws a fine henna vine across the card as you watch, under a henna jhalar hung from the top edge. Mogra opens an emerald curtain on a little palm squirrel hauling up one more jasmine gajra, and Shagun shows a brass thali heaped with henna leaves, filled cones and rose petals. More in our mehendi collection.

Sample wording

Relaxed and personal:

Ishani's mehendi. An afternoon of henna, music and long conversations. Come with empty hands, leave with patterned ones.

Formal:

We request the pleasure of your company at the mehendi ceremony of our daughter Ishani. Friday, 17 April, from 4 in the afternoon. The Kapoor Haveli, Civil Lines, Jaipur.

With a dress code:

Dress code: every shade of green. Mehendi artists will be with us all afternoon, so do come early.

In Hindi:

मेहंदी की रस्म में आप सादर आमंत्रित हैं।

मेहंदी रचाने आइए, ढोलक की थाप पर गीत गाने आइए।

A small, charming touch for the bride's own card: many families keep up the custom of hiding the groom's name in her mehendi. It makes a sweet closing line on the details card: and yes, we will be hiding his name somewhere in the henna.

Sangeet invitations

The sangeet is the evening of music and dance, often the most anticipated night of the week. In many North Indian homes it began as the mahila sangeet, with women of the family singing to the dholak, and it has grown into an evening of performances by both families. Gujarati families often hold a garba or dandiya raas, and many Punjabi families add a jaago, the late night procession with a pot of lit lamps carried through the neighbourhood.

Design ideas

Sangeet cards can go darker and richer than the rest of the suite: plum, midnight, deep rose, with candlelight and gold. Instruments make natural motifs: a tabla with ghungroo, a harmonium, a gramophone, lanterns.

Seen hereTaalSangeet invitation

Taal is a plum-dark sangeet night: ghungroo draped over a tabla tremble with every beat while the drum skins shiver and tiny gold bols, dha, dhin, tin, ta, rise into the air. Mehfil has an old gramophone playing on a rug, its horn heaped with marigolds, and Chandni sets the evening under a full moon over a lake palace in Udaipur. For a Hyderabad celebration, Moti places a tray of Nizami pearls and a cup of Irani chai on a balcony with Charminar glowing beyond. Browse the full sangeet collection.

Sample wording

Warm and inviting:

An evening of music and dance before the wedding. Join us for the sangeet of Ishani and Aarav. Saturday, 18 April, 8 in the evening. Rambagh Palace, Jaipur.

Playful:

Practise your steps. There will be a stage, there will be a dholak, and there will be no excuses.

With a dress code:

Dress code: jewel tones and your dancing shoes.

In Hindi:

संगीत संध्या में आप सपरिवार सादर आमंत्रित हैं।

ढोलक की थाप, गीतों की रात, आपके बिना अधूरी है।

If family members are performing, the sangeet card is also a good place for a gentle nudge: rehearsals begin next Sunday, at Nani's.

Wording tips for all three events

• Lead with the event and the names, then the date, time and place. Everything else is secondary.
• Use the family's own words. If your grandmother calls it the pithi, call it the pithi.
• Keep Hindi and English on separate lines rather than mixing them mid-sentence. Both read more gracefully that way.
• Write the closing line last. It is the sentence guests remember: come swing by, see you on the dance floor, we cannot wait to celebrate with you.

For the main wedding card, our guide to wedding invitation wording in Hindi and English has formal samples for parents hosting and couples hosting, with traditional blessing lines.

Ordering your event cards

Every Taarikh invitation is illustrated in our studio and personalised for your family. Choose a design, send us your names, timings and venues on WhatsApp, and we will send a proof within 48 hours, with two rounds of changes included. A still card is ₹5,000 and an animated one is ₹10,000. If you would like your haldi, mehendi and sangeet cards to share a single design language, tell us when you write and we will quote the set.