As trends go, the wedding industry is worth P1 billion annually, and more women are lining up to offer their services as wedding planners/coordinators.

No wonder, their association now counts at least 100 members.

Rita Neri, the pioneer, is still so busy planning and coordinating that she has had no time to get wed!

It used to be that brides-to-be and their mothers would get excited over the prospect of planning every infinitesimal detail of the wedding, but as life has become more demanding in terms of making a statement about one’s lifestyle and social status, the role of the wedding planner has grown, and grown exponentially. (The wedding I attended last month took seven hours to unfold, and I’m not complaining.)

As the business of tying the knot or knots becomes ever more complicated – a case of brides and their parents keeping up with the Joneses? – a subplot has emerged. The latest must-have in Wedding Bells Land: the couple looking picture-perfect on their wedding day, not only for the cameras but also for each other. Enter: the doctor of aesthetic medicine offering “facial contouring and body sculpting” through a myriad series of treatments such as Resonax technology and lipo-therapy (for “leaner facial profiles” as well as to “produce definitive silhouettes”), diamond peel, skin whitening, laser hair removal, Botox injections, weight reduction, and specially for the bridegroom, more or younger-looking hair.

Zen Institute’s Dr. Mary Jane Valdecanas, a sister of Justice Secretary Agnes Devanadera, says looking good at the start of the rest of their lives together is the best gift the lovebirds can give each other. (Yes, but will they recognize each other when they meet at the altar?)

Kate Lagman of Jewelmer has another suggestion for “Bulong Pulungan”: Give the bride a precious pearl or a string of them and defy the superstition that pearls symbolize tears, a legend that goes back to antiquity among the Greeks, who believed that pearls were the tears shed by the moon. If I were the bride, I would have reason to weep if my husband-to-be could not afford to give me a pearl or two to wear on my day of days.