Design with ambition
The fourth edition of the AlUla Design Award connects international designers with landscape and heritage.
Made by hand
As AlUla strengthens its position as a place where craft, culture and contemporary creativity meet, the AlUla Design Award has emerged as one of its most outward-facing platforms, an invitation to designers around the world to engage with a landscape and heritage rich in material and narrative possibility. Though it was established only a few years ago, the award is quickly gaining international traction. “For the past sixty years, the world has followed a familiar script,” says jury member Guillaume Houzé. “That era is ending. A truly multipolar landscape is emerging. Culture, design and creation must lead the way.”
For an internationally renowned award, this is one that remains, at heart, intimately connected to place. Each edition challenges designers to respond to AlUla’s histories, materials and environments, and past winners have demonstrated how far that provocation can stretch. Hind AlRawaf, arts and culture production and trading manager at Arts AlUla and a member of the jury, points to British designer Harry Dobbs, who 3D-printed a carafe and cup set using stone from AlUla, an object that went on to win both the AlUla Design Award and a Red Dot Award. “We’ve had regional and international designers participate,” she says. “Their products reflect the history and nature of AlUla, and some have received global attention because of it.”
The award has expanded to include two categories – product design and fashion – and submissions have broadened, with designers applying from China, Singapore, the US and Europe.
The theme for 2025, ‘The Ingenuity of the Human Hand’, was announced in alignment with Saudi Arabia’s Year of Handicrafts. It underscores the value of manual skill, material sensitivity and emotional intelligence. “It’s about craft,” says AlRawaf. “Working with clay, with natural materials, working with local artisans. We’ve always cared about handcrafts, and this year we wanted to highlight them even more.”
Houzé sees the theme as a universal call. “It touches a fundamental need: to reclaim what is deeply human, how we sense, shape and respond to the world and its materials. There is no hierarchy of ‘high’ or ‘low’. Only the shared ingenuity of the body, the hands, and the emotions they express.”
It’s only the award’s fourth edition, but its trajectory is strong. “There’s always room to grow,” says AlRawaf. “But each year, the award becomes more international, more diverse and more exciting in terms of how designers are thinking.”
If AlUla is shaping a new chapter for design in the region, the AlUla Design Award is one of the places where that story becomes visible – object by object, material by material and hand by hand.
The next wave of Saudi design talent
The inaugural AlUla Designathon brought a burst of creativity, inviting emerging talent to learn from expert mentors and test ideas. Twenty participants, spanning fashion, product and design, explored the theme The Ingenuity of the Human Hand. “Immersed in the intensity of a timed format, participants translated ideas into concise design proposals that ranged from collecting memories tied to archaeological sites, to reinterpreting natural elements and AlUla’s unique sense of light through domestic objects,” says Emily Marant, mentor and founder of Studio Marant.
Now, a selection of these works is on show during the 2026 AlUla Arts Festival, offering visitors a glimpse of the designers set to shape the future of Saudi design.
