NUUN: Tuwaiq High Jewellery Collection with a Unique Mineral

For tourists, the Tuwaiq desert and escarpment in Saudi Arabia is one of the exotic attractions that, when compared to the other striking sights of the country, might soon fade away from memory. However, in the eyes of an individual with a creative mind, uninhabited expanses of desert and rocks look much more expressive and captivating. Their natural beauty and mysterious silhouettes can become a source of inspiration for a beautiful art object or a whole collection of high jewellery pieces – as it happened in the case of the new Tuwaiq line by NUUN.

“During a conversation, one of my brothers showed me topographical shots of the desert and we came across some beautiful satellite images. The terrain and the patterns of the rocks were magnificent and I just could not get them out of my head,” says Nourah Al-Faisal, founder and head designer NUUN, describing how the jewels came about.

In order to realise her creative idea, Nourah took the beauty of nature and its organic shapes as a basis of her work and materialised them through a harmonious combination of geometric elements. She has already worked in this direction while creating her previous Ombre collection. Such design technique allowed Nourah to avoid a literal interpretation of her inspiration source that is frequently used to create naturalistic jewellery. As a result, the Tuwaiq collection beautifully reflected how the world around could be turned into artistic jewellery.

Indeed, the dark streaks on the basis of white ornamental stone perfectly echo the inclusions in diamonds and simultaneously evoke patterns created by the wind across the desert sand. As you might have noticed, jewellers rarely use natural howlite – a grey-white mineral with brown and black veins and a silky glow. Not everyone knows about its existence. So, how did Nourah discover it?

Let’s withdraw our attention from the spectacular ensemble of the hard stone’s matte surface and the sparkle of polished diamonds and observe the architecture of the cuff bracelet. Its design has been thought through to the smallest details not only from the functional point of view (the statement cuff is easy and comfortable to wear) but also in terms of aesthetics. In order to convey the image of Tuwaiq’s rocky landscape, Nourah has used a very interesting ‘trick.’ She placed flat, carved howlite at different levels next to each other, so that the surface of the bracelet appeared to have volume and relief just like a rock.

Apart from the eye-catching cuff bracelet and the gorgeous necklaces, Tuwaiq collection includes some more delicate items: a long necklace with rhombus shaped howlite and diamonds with a matching bracelet, pyramid shaped earrings on a chain, another bracelet that matches the main necklace with a slice diamond and a wrist decoration shaped like an open-end triangular bracelet.

Howlite and diamonds with inclusions have the modernity and graphic quality that I was looking for and they remind me of Tuwaiq. So putting them together made perfect sense to me. I love it when that happens; when everything falls into place naturally – and that, for me, is really the best way to create a collection. – Nourah Al-Faisal