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My timeline has been filled with a number of new launches. The photoshoots have ranged from those in bright dresses frolicking through valleys and wearing beautiful jewellery to those whipping their long gajra-laden braids and jingling stacks of jhumkas. But no Spring Summer jewellery campaign had made me pause and take notice like the one from homegrown label Yamin.
Yamin’s new collection, titled Genesis, doesn’t shout for attention. It invites you in with a quiet intensity, with its bold departure from conventional jewellery campaigns that centre feminine adornment through soft visuals. Genesis gives us a radical imagining of jewellery without the femme body — or rather, jewellery that speaks to the femme experience without being presented through its physical representation.
Shot in Madrid’s El Retiro Park, the campaign leans heavily into imagery evoking the Garden of Eden. But not in the way it’s been historically painted, it has almost been reimagined through an anti-patriarchal lens. Gone is Eve as the temptress or naïve creation. In her place: a bare-chested man in bold, layered jewellery, styled with satin opera gloves, accessorised with a bandana and dressed sharp. The body becomes a canvas — and a confrontation.
The brand, founded by Huma and Vikram Hazarika in honour of their late mother Yamin Hazarika (India’s first female police officer from the Northeast), has always worked to dismantle conventional narratives around gender and representation. Their first collection used text and symbolism to speak to empowerment; their second is even more layered. Two years ago, when the brand initially launched, I had the honour to interview the founders and learn of the story behind the brand right from them, which you can read here.Even that conversation, had led us to the topic of adornment and empowerment.
The latest collection Genesis, looks at how the female form has long been objectified, framed for the male gaze, and replicated in media through a patriarchal lens. But rather than centring a new ‘ideal’ or recasting the female body in a softer light, Yamin boldly takes the gaze away from the femme body entirely. However, the jewellery speaks. Enamel-painted coral reefs, seahorses, and starfish emerge like symbols of mysterious deep waters. A coral pendant nestles against a sculpted torso. Pearl-drop earrings with an eye motif reminiscent of Dali paintings dangle from ears. The collection, meticulously crafted and hand-finished with 18k gold plating and freshwater pearls, feels like an offering to history, and reclamation.
The visual campaign feels cinematic — like outtakes from an Italian art film, but sharper. Yes, there is vulnerability in the models' eyes, in the way they hold their faces with gloved hands, or look away from the camera. But these aren't poses of seduction; they’re closer to states of reflection - contorted like the statues of the male form. But the absence of the feminine bodies doesn’t erase femininity — it instead allows the designs to speak volumes without the weight of objectification. According to the brand, with this collection, “we made a conscious effort to seek out female forms as interpreted by female artists such as Judy Chicago & Augusta Savage, that were devoid of the sexual lens through which the female form has been portrayed through most of history. Closer home, we were inspired by the work of contemporary artist Gauri Sharma, whose untitled work featuring pregnant figurines, laid the foundation for a recurring design motif in our new collection.”
But taking the inspiration to an even wider lens, the brand alluded to the conception of creation as one that emerged from the water, through its ocean life-inspired designs. The mermaid core motifs - often associated with hyper-feminine aesthetics - are rendered with rich, textural detail that somehow still manages to be grounded.
What’s striking is how the campaign doesn’t replace one form of gaze with another. It simply redirects it away from the object and toward the story. It speaks to how women have historically been created in art through others’ imaginations. And how those imaginations often served to limit rather than liberate. Yamin offers an alternate perspective where bodies, forms, genders, and jewels aren’t in service to beauty alone, but to expression.
This nuance extends beyond the visual to the brand’s own production practices. Yamin is deeply committed to slow fashion, having collaborated with local artisans, producing in limited quantities, and staying true to principles of sustainability and fair trade. Their jewellery isn't trend-driven, but timeless in both aesthetic and intention. It invites wearers into a community of choice — to support art, ethics, and equity — not just style. To top it all off, Huma’s personal passion towards animal welfare is a continuing aspect of the brand, with 10% of their sales going towards the welfare of strays, under the initiative titled ‘Yamin Gives Back’.
Genesis by Yamin as a collection is powerful in what it dares not to do. It doesn’t explain itself. It doesn’t moralise or sell an aspirational dream. It simply exists — quietly radical, poetically political. It imagines a world where womankind isn’t created for the gaze, but seen — but on her own terms.
You can follow Yamin here.
