Hanut Singh Tourmaline Earrings
Designer: Hanut Singh
Creative Director: Madeline Weinrib
Dimensions: 3.25 x 1 in
Materials: Watermelon tourmaline, ruby, diamond, and pearl double-drop earrings
Details: Each piece comes in a Hanut Singh padded jewelry box
This celebratory initiative commemorates the exceptional Islamic art collections at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, and The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, by engaging with global artisans such as Hanut Singh through The Heirloom Project.
An opulent brooch crafted by Cartier around 1920 has inspired two new pairs of earrings designed by Singh for The Met Store in New York and MFA Shop in Houston. The original adornment in the Met's holdings boasts a 17th-century Mughal emerald carved with a leafy lotus blossom; in the 1920s, western jewelers popularly repurposed radiant Mughal jewels.
For just over ten years Hanut Singh has been quietly and meticulously designing jewelry that at once reveals his modern sensibility, appreciation of history and obsession with craftsmanship. The personal touch he applies to his creations extends to the way he has presented them exclusively at private trunk shows and by-appointment-only boutiques. From these viewings word-of-mouth buzz has grown into a significant cult following. Diane von Furstenberg, Mary-Kate Olsen, Wendi Deng Murdoch, Beyoncé, Madonna and Christian Louboutin are just a handful of his clients.
Although he was never formally trained, Hanut’s jewellery education truly began from the time he was a child. The designer is a descendant of the Kapurthala royal family of India who astonished the world with their style in the first half of the twentieth century. The family’s legendary treasures and discriminating taste inspired the greatest jewelry houses in the world to new heights.
Hanut Singh's jewelry evokes a timeless cosmopolitanism. Taking inspiration from the fragile delicacy of the floral to the strongly geometric, Hanut's work bridges the modern and the ancient, the Indic and the European. He inventively interweaves the pietra dura techniques of medieval Mughal and Rajput ateliers with the later art deco and art nouveau, creating jewels which are evocative and subtly beautiful. Stone within stones, pearl with shell, crystal with gold, they create worlds within worlds, bringing the fragrance of flowers and the radiance of starlight. His jewelry is born of Puja, that everyday recognition of the mystery of the divine; Maya, the illusory grandeur of royal spectacle and pageantry; and Lila, the play of life that celebrates the energies of all living beings.
Produced for The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, in partnership with Madeline Weinrib, creative director for The Heirloom Project.