Aya Al-Shalal is an Iraqi-Canadian jewellery designer and multidisciplinary artist based in London, who recently completed her MA in Jewellery Design at Central Saint Martins following a background in Architecture and Material Art & Design. Working at the intersection of contemporary jewellery, craft, and cultural research, her practice is informed by a family history of curating, collecting, and preserving tribal and Bedouin crafts, jewellery, silversmithing traditions, textiles, and material culture from Iraq and the wider SWANA region.
Current Obsession: Could you tell us the story behind your graduation project and what drew you to the subject?
Aya Al-Shalal: My work reinterprets endangered Iraqi and Bedouin jewellery traditions by combining traditional craft with sculptural and experimental forms alongside digital processes, through extensive archival research, material experimentation, and contemporary making techniques, creating speculative collections that preserve, reinterpret, and evolve cultural heritage for contemporary fashion cultures and alternative diasporic communities. I explore how ancestral knowledge can remain relevant through changing identities and cultural expression, positioning jewellery as a living archive that bridges heritage, innovation, and contemporary forms of cultural storytelling.
CO: Beyond the gallery, where do you see your work taking root and finding its life? Who do you hope to reach with your work?
AA: Beyond the gallery, I see my work taking root within fashion, performance, and contemporary and alternative cultural spaces. I hope to collaborate with brands, communities, and performance artists whose values align with my own, such as Kiss Facility, FKA, Rosalia, etc.
CO: What’s your favourite studio ritual?
AA: When you reach a rhythmic pattern of making, whether through the lathe, emery, or polishing, you become completely intertwined with the piece and its progression. It’s a meditative feeling, where you become part of the work through the physical acts of making.
