Imaging by: Santanu Mallick

A wedding starts out as an affair that you planned in your dreams — and one that you are determined to pull off to perfection. But if you are not mindful, the countdown will begin before you can say ‘trousseau’ and set you off into a tailspin.

You might find yourself in a situation where the invitations have not been sent out, the guest-lists are yet to be drawn up and your friends don’t know yet what they have been assigned on the to-do list. Important jobs left undone that threaten to unravel all the efforts you have put into planning your Big Day.

So, take a deep breath and simply launch a wedsite — or a personal wedding website that’s the current mantra for hip, engaged couples — and share your wedding plans with the world.

The idea is to have a dedicated space that you can customise completely — that would include a personalised domain name to the theme, stories of how you met and even maps to the wedding venue. Heck, you can even collect online RSVPs.

Cashing in on the trend is a deluge of wedding websites that allow couples to register their own wedsites (or host their very own web addresses). While some are paid for, others come gratis.

“Having come across a close friend’s wedding website, I realised how all the important information can be shared so comprehensively — from pictures and videos to even the wedding invitation,’’ says Gaurav Kumar, the co-founder of an Indian wedding website, WeddingOcean (www.weddingocean.com) that’s been up and running since December 2007.

Opening one takes just a few minutes and no matter which part of the world you are in, you can register instantly even with international websites.

The emphasis is on the fact that if you can plan your wedding, you can have fun doing it. A couple of other Indian websites that have leapt into the fray are WebVivah (www.webvivah.com) that allows a free trial of 10 days after which you have to pay for the services, and, a free wedding website called OurWedding (www.ourwedding.in).

To spread the word, you can simply shoot off an email to family and friends and later print the wedsite address on the wedding invitation. But to keep unwanted visitors at bay, you can keep the site password-protected and give out passwords to those you want to keep in the know.

How do you keep the site mint fresh? Just blog regularly with updates in the run-up to the wedding. And to keep it interactive, maintain a wedding guestbook which your friends can scrawl on.

Yes, these sites are getting all the hits. Says Matthew Kelly, who came up with his own website Ewedding in 2002: “Social media and sharing is huge. Brides want a quick and easy way to share their big day and to create a custom wedding website could fit into their daily routine of sharing the wedding information online.”

The sites are enjoying an ever expanding client list. While WeddingOcean has some 4,000 wedsites in its kitty, international websites like Momentville (www.momentville.com) has nearly 1 lakh wedsites. Meanwhile, Ewedding (www.ewedding.com) adds about 500 new couples per day to its kitty.

If you are in a quandary as to when you should start your own address, Michael Benson of WedQuarters (www.wedquarters.com), a website started in 2002, says: “Rem-ember to give yourself enough time so that you can include your web address on any wedding stationery you want.”

Ewedding too offers free wedding wedsites for 12 months and allows unlimited photo uploads. Others like WeddingOcean, Nearlyweds (www.nearlyweds.com) and Myevent (www.myevent.com) are paid services.

At WeddingOcean the packages are priced starting at $19 (Rs 860) for six months. Subscriptions typically start at $10 (Rs 451) for a month’s usage on Myevent while Nearlyweds charges about $49 (Rs 2,212) for a span of two years.

Some like Momentville have bunged in extra features. “Wedding planning tools such as a wedding budget planner, wedding checklist and even a wedding vendor lists help you manage everything under one umbrella,” says Geoff Evason, who came up with the idea to create MomentVille, now a three-year-old website, while preparing for his own wedding.

When the time comes to shut down the wedsite, you don’t have to wave it goodbye forever. Instead, you can request for your personal wedding website in a CD format as a keepsake. Wedquarters, for instance, offers it at an introductory rate of $34.95 USD (Rs 1,580) plus shipping.

They might all have one thing in common — building a run- up to the wedding — but each website has a unique selling point.

GroomGroove (www.groomgroove.com), for instance, is a one-stop shop for the groom to be. The site’s founder, Michael Arnot, who describes himself as a lawyer by training and by virtue of his work with GroomGroove.com a groom forever, provides men with a complete and comprehensive guide.

“There’s a lot that guys need to do in order to get ready for their weddings,” says Arnot, who started GroomGroove in 2007. According to him, from choosing the engagement ring and getting all toned before the wedding day to even dealing with an eventuality of calling the whole thing off, GroomGroove.com has the men nicely covered.

Meanwhile MomentVille allows you to sign up for free if you want a basic wedding site. It offers free themes for you to sift through for your page. That is, till you decide you want it premium and all the fancy stuff, from the music to more stylised themes. Psst: But you can do without those and keep it simple and user-friendly.

So dear busy bride, are you set to make a head start?