Problems With Wedding Planning in 2024
In 2024, we have seen wedding planning problems that differ from previous years. Besides fraud, no-shows, and other issues from substandard organizers, we have also increasingly seen people speak out about worry and relationships breaking down before and during the wedding planning process.
Arguments over dowry, over the color scheme of the wedding, the venue, the format of the ceremony, the bride being demanding, the groom being indifferent, and many other issues, often end with stories of relationships breaking down, weddings being cancelled, outbursts of anger, loss of the relationship, or enduring frustration throughout the entire marriage — leading to severe conditions for divorce down the road.
These stories are increasingly being shared in various wedding-planning groups. Of course, this is a reality that has always existed in weddings, and it has grown heavier in this era, as people today increasingly lack ways of interacting with one another. This is because a wedding is an activity that brings two families together — sometimes from different cultures, sometimes from different religions, sometimes from different countries — to carry out an important activity together, take care of each other’s guests, and deal with religious rites as well as social appearances.
Family relationships fall apart, vendors cheat, planners flake — when the wedding industry doesn’t deliver, and “at least..” becomes a normal thing to say when planning a wedding
Key Questions About Weddings
“Why does wedding planning make people fight?” “Why is an Islamic wedding so complicated?” “Why do marriages between families of different religions run into problems?” “Is a good relationship really the answer?” These are questions that “Khun Nai Araya Bangkok Shop” has been asking since the beginning of 2012, and has continually tried to build systems to answer, until we succeeded in building the Wedding Workshop framework that same year. We set out with the premise that a good wedding must also lead to a good relationship, bringing marketing management frameworks and adapting them anew, so as to create a systematic planning process, reduce risk, focus on the various relationships involved, as well as keep the organization orderly.
If we ask for the results of that framework, what we can answer is our track record and our growth from a small studio, Khun Nai Araya, into ARAYA Nikah Co., a social enterprise that handles both international and domestic Islamic weddings. Today, this framework is used not only to look at interfaith relationships, but also cross-cultural and cross-national relationships.
Good Relationships in an Islamic Wedding
A good relationship matters, and is one of the things Islam regards as a form of barakah, or blessing, that should be present in an Islamic religious ceremony, known as the nikah. This is because the nikah is an activity in which both families come together to make a sincere and simple covenant with one another before witnesses and before God. Of course it is simple, but it cannot lack care, cannot lack a willingness to learn and adapt, and cannot lack mutual respect. All of this is the blessing found within an Islamic wedding, which ARAYA believes must be well managed and firmly rooted in the correct purpose of organizing a wedding.
At present, the wedding industry, whether in Thailand or abroad, still has no tool that addresses relationships, because they are abstract, personal, and not a tangible product that can generate profit. What the industry still focuses on is beauty and meeting the wants of the bride or groom, and sometimes that focus ends up breaking down the relationship and mental well-being. However, the concept of relationships has started to appear to some extent, such as wedding therapy, which helps heal the bride and groom “so they suffer less from planning the wedding” — even though, really, a wedding, which should be good news, should not require anyone to suffer at all.
Protecting Integrity in Weddings
Building on the development of relationship-focused work in weddings, ARAYA Nikah has now begun developing and publishing a framework to protect the integrity of the marriage, because in international marriages, beyond the love between bride and groom, there are also issues of marriages entered into in bad faith — such as human trafficking, someone fleeing a husband or wife to enter into a second marriage, marrying for the right to stay in Thailand, marrying a child, or other issues. We very much hope that the framework we have developed will help reduce the risk to women and children of encountering these problems when entering into an Islamic marriage, known as nikah, because nikah should be something that brings blessing and builds good, honest relationships for everyone involved.
Raising the Standard of Weddings in Thailand
As we have always said, organizing and running the show may no longer be enough on their own to manage a wedding. When you come to ARAYA, you will receive the same things every organizer offers — running the show, an MC, decoration, beauty, halal food — but we will take you and your family one step further in the wedding, a step that returns to integrity, goodness, peace, and blessing — the true value of an Islamic wedding, together with the most professional event management available in the Thai market. This will be a gift for every family.
Workshops for Weddings in 2025
See you at the workshop in 2025! From introducing the relationship, the proposal, learning about the religion, arranging an officiant, legal documents, wedding planning, the venue, halal food, bridal and groom attire, hair and makeup with hijab styling, photographers, videographers, the run-of-show team and MC team, nikah equipment, and everything else in the world of Islamic weddings will be made simple through ARAYA’s system — an organization registered with the government as a social enterprise, alongside running as a self-sustaining business. See you at the next one!
Planning a legally-recognized Nikah in Thailand? Start here →
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