As per usual, we value the attendees’ experience above all, and the trick to make your experience memorable is to engage all five senses. It’s all about the smallest of details that often go unnoticed in our daily lives.
For our latest project, we designed / planned Gafla Jewellery's official launch throughout this year’s Dubai Design Week at Dubai Design District, taking place from the 27th to the 31st of October. The theme focused on UAE’s rich heritage - with a contemporary twist!
The Eastern nomad traders’ journey in the desert and their traditional family life, as well as their waterborne professions, were among the inspirations behind Gafla (which is Arabic for ‘Caravan’). The collection successfully portrays UAE’s historical culture in the form of graceful jewellery. And accordingly, we wanted to recreate the simple pleasures in the stages of the nomads’ familial lifestyle.
Design connoisseurs as well as design enthusiasts visiting the event were walked through a rather modernized version of UAE’s historical heritage. Each installation and the overall layout functioning as a revisit to UAE’s celebrated customs.
The “tour” kicked off with an installation of a projection screen, on which a short film conveying Gafla’s vision and their inspiration behind their collections, is repeatedly played during the entire course of the event.
We had the collections – which are collectively titled ‘Nomads in Arabia’, and consisting of statement as well as limited pieces – displayed under glass cases, with the use of palm tree fronds and pottery-wares exhibited as the jewellery holders. Various geometric-esque tent-stands were installed for four allocated sections, dispersing the collections across the exhibition space. The tent-stands, simultaneously, were used to project visuals which further accentuated the collections.
The installations were also supported by a live performance of the infamous Emirati tradition of pearling, showing a behind-the-scenes process of the creation of Gafla’s gems.
In addition to Gafla’s perfume bottle-inspired collection, it was followed by Tola Perfumery’s collaboration, which summed up the memorable experience wherein all five senses were literally engaged. The visitors would wear their fragrances (literally) by locking their favorite scent from Tola in one of Gafla’s bottled trinkets! As it goes without saying, the aroma of the place is the final touch to fully captivate the visitors’ memory which included incense burning of the classics, ranging from Oud to Santalum. Every detail was attentively executed, in order to further enliven the Emirati cultural experience.
www.gaflajewellery.com
