Saturday 21 / December / 2024
Muscat: Diamonds or gold are usually considered a woman’s best friend, but semi-precious stones are quickly climbing up the trend ladder in women’s jewellery.
Boutique Tariq features in today’s #OmanPride, where a visionary owner modernises traditional Omani jewellery, such as necklaces, bracelets and earrings, using semi-precious stones and pure Omani silver.
Tariq Mohammad Abu Bakr Al Balushi, the owner and the man behind the intricate designs, has been working on innovative and modern jewellery with an Omani twist for 20 years at the store his father opened 45 years ago.
“This was my father’s business and I took over after he passed away. We used to sell big, chunky (Omani) jewellery, until I had the idea of integrating semi-precious stones with Omani silver,” said Al Balushi.
“We keep changing the designs and making new pieces; and every six months we display a collection... more-so whenever the time is right,” he added.
Each design is unique and one-of-a-kind. Customers leave the store knowing they purchased a piece of jewellery that has not been duplicated, nor existed anywhere other than in their possession.
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When Tariq first started carrying out his ideas, he handcrafted the jewellery himself. Today he owns a workshop with five trained employees to make his designs come to life.
Stones, such as amethyst, turquoise, quartz, marjan, amazonite and aquamarine, as well as pearls, are added to traditional Omani silver jewellery to give it the pop and modernity that today’s trend in jewellery is showing.
Tariq uses 925 pure Omani silver. He explained that he has a large cache of silver, such as traditional anklets, bracelets and old Omani silver coins, which his staff melts and uses for their Omani-inspired silver designs.
It is unfortunate that the stones used are from around the world and not Omani, Tariq stated. He travels to Hong Kong twice a year to attend a jewellery exhibition, buys the stones himself from several dealers and brings them back to the Sultanate for his designs.
He expressed his frustration that mining or retrieving stones from Omani soil is banned by the government.
“We have plenty of stones in Oman. The mountains are filled with amazing stones, kile turquoise and granite. The only problem is we are not allowed to take them.
“Besides, if I wanted to take a rock, I’m going to need machines to cut the stones and special tools,and such requests are not granted, since collecting precious stones is banned,” Al Balushi stated.
He said that 10 years ago he obtained corals from the mountains and pearls from the sea, before this was outlawed.
Nevertheless, his store remains popular among local residents and tourists. Boutique Tariq is located along the narrow alleyway leading inside the market, near the gold market building of Muttrah Souq, lane 1427, shop number 1494.
His store is open from Saturday to Thursday from 10am to 1pm and 4pm to 10pm.
Prices range from OMR25 – OMR600.
