In 1997, Valérie Barkowski extracted a single stitch from Fez embroidery, enlarged it, and irregularly dispersed it across a white cotton pillowcase. This was the first piece of the Noon collection. Twenty-nine years later, it is still handcrafted in the Marrakech workshop, with the same technique, using the same thread.
Fez Embroidery: What Makes It Unique
Fez embroidery, or Tarz el Ghorza, is one of the most complex embroidered techniques in Moroccan heritage. Its outline stitch is created without a preliminary drawing: the embroiderer counts the warp and weft threads, starts from the center of the piece, and constructs geometric patterns from the inside out.
Its absolute uniqueness lies in the fact that the front and back are strictly identical. No attachment points, no loose threads are visible. The patterns – stars, crosses, arabesques – are impeccable on both sides. A level of precision few embroidery techniques achieve.
Traditionally monochrome, it unfolds in blue, garnet, green, or plum. However, this work was not found in shops. It lived behind the walls of homes, passed down between mothers and daughters, reserved for wedding trousseaux. Valérie Barkowski discovered it in this domestic, non-commercial space, invisible from the street.
“Upon my arrival in Marrakech, this embroidery captivated me – an absolute precision that conveys an impression of simplicity. So perfectly ordered, symmetrical, and impeccable.”
From Traditional Technique to Noon: A Deconstruction
Traditional Fez embroidery forms large, structured patterns that cover the entire surface. Valérie Barkowski chose to deconstruct it: she extracted a single stitch – a small eight-pointed star forming a square – and isolated it.
She enlarged this unique stitch, changed its scale, then irregularly dispersed it across the entire surface of a pillowcase, and then along the edge of a bedsheet. The result: an embroidery that retains the rigor of the Fez stitch while producing a radically different, airy, minimalist, contemporary visual effect.
This is the brand’s consistent working method: identify a savoir-faire, understand its internal logic, extract an element, change the scale. Not to copy. To reinterpret.
“I extracted the stitch, enlarged it, and scattered it. The impression is similar, but the result is entirely different. Noon embroidery is a personal interpretation of a long-standing tradition.”
Summer 1997: The First Pieces, The First Embroiderer
To produce the first pieces, embroiderers capable of maintaining the required level of precision had to be found. Valérie Barkowski leveraged the medina’s network. She found an association of women initiated into artisanal embroidery by Moroccan Catholic sisters.
The first embroiderer was named Rabea. She lived in Dar Bacha, a stone’s throw from what would become the V.Barkowski boutique. She had difficulty walking, a malformation. They did not speak the same language. But the first sample she delivered was impeccable: the stars were small, perfect, regularly irregular. Both sides identical. Not a single thread out of place.
Then Rabea revealed that of the sum paid by the association, only 32% was given to her. The discovery was brutal: an institution presenting itself as protective was siphoning off the wages of its own workers. This was the first lesson in a reality that would take years to fully unfold – that of intermediaries who capture a share of the artisans’ work, sometimes under the guise of charity, sometimes even within the team. Employees of the workshop, better paid than the embroiderers, demanded a commission from them in exchange for orders. This continued for years before being discovered.
This initial contact opened a network. The embroiderers of the medina work from home, a Moroccan social reality: for women whose family obligations limit travel, working from home represents access to their own income, in a country where the role of women remains, in some circles, confined to the domestic sphere.
Once the first women were found, dozens more followed. Each embroiderer works from home, at her own pace. The Marrakech textile workshop receives, inspects, and assembles. During the busiest periods, up to five hundred embroiderers work simultaneously for the brand.
Each embroiderer produces at her own pace, in her own style. This imposes a logistical constraint: a client order must be embroidered by a single person to ensure the visual coherence of the piece. Slowness is part of the system.
The workshop now operates on a smaller scale, with the same exacting standards and techniques.
Twenty-Nine Years of Collection: What Has Changed, What Remains
The Noon collection has evolved. The pattern has grown over the years, and this change in scale has a direct technical consequence: the double-sided Fez embroidery, characteristic of the original technique, becomes more difficult to apply to larger formats. Current pieces are embroidered on one side only. The design remains identical, the precision intact; it is the scale of the pattern that makes reversible work impractical at these dimensions.
The collection now covers hand-embroidered bed linen,duvet covers, sheets, pillowcases, and embroidered table linen, tablecloths, placemats, napkins. Always in white mercerized combed cotton poplin for bed linen, a coarser cotton for table linen, and linen available upon request. The embroidery colors are infinite: solid tones or multicolored assortments from our collections, or even a color straight from a client’s imagination who provides us with their Pantone.
What does not change: the stitch itself, the technique, the hand. And the increasing difficulty in finding embroiderers capable of maintaining it. The savoir-faire is less frequently transmitted. Wedding trousseaux, the traditional space where women embroidered for months, surrounded by their mothers and aunts, are now outsourced or replaced by machine embroidery. Embroiderers trained in the exact technique of the Noon collection become rarer each year.
“Twenty-nine years later, Noon embroidery is still as loved and purchased. But I see that the tradition is fading. The stitch itself is changing. This explains why each piece takes the time it takes – and that this time is incompressible.”
The Noon embroidery is the first collection of embroidered home linen designed by Valérie Barkowski in Morocco. It is also its guiding thread: it established the method, opened the network, and taught the codes. Everything that followed – other embroideries, trimmings, the AYA, NIL, YUMI collections – stems from this same approach: local savoir-faire, personal reinterpretation, and production that provides home-based work.
An object can endure through time when it is built on sound internal logic. The Noon collection is its longest demonstration.
Fez embroidery, or Tarz el Ghorza, is a traditional Moroccan embroidery technique originating from the imperial city of Fez. It is constructed using a counted outline stitch, without a preliminary drawing, and its particularity is that it is strictly identical on the front and back of the fabric. The geometric, symmetrical patterns are usually monochrome: blue, garnet, green, plum.
How is Noon embroidery different from traditional Fez embroidery?
Noon embroidery starts from the same basic stitch as Fez embroidery, but extracts a single motif, an eight-pointed star, which it enlarges and disperses irregularly across the entire surface of the linen. Traditional embroidery covers the piece with large, structured, dense patterns. Noon is airy, minimalist, contemporary. It is a reinterpretation, not a reproduction.
Is Noon linen available custom-made?
Yes. Dimensions, embroidery color, and material (cotton or linen) are fully customizable. Simply send a Pantone or fabric sample to sales@valeriebarkowski.com. Custom orders are subject to an individual quote.
How to care for Noon embroidered linen?
Noon hand-embroidered bed linen can be machine washed at 40° on a delicate cycle. Air drying is preferable to preserve the embroidery. For ironing, turn the piece inside out and iron on the reverse side.
What is the difference between Noon, Kross, and Otis embroideries?
The three collections are based on distinct Moroccan artisanal embroidery stitches. Noon starts from the Fez stitch, a scattered star motif. Kross and Otis interpret other stitches and create different visual effects, more geometric, denser. All are handcrafted in the Marrakech textile workshop.
V.Barkowski home linen collections are rooted in mastered textile techniques: embroidery stitched point by point, trimmings crafted in the workshop, tassels assembled by hand, and precise finishes that require true expertise. These pieces follow neither an industrial pace nor a standardized gesture. They are designed to last, to be used every day, and to stand …
Accessories and unique pieces available only in our Marrakech boutique In our Marrakech store, everything is created with a free, spontaneous approach. There’ s no fixed calendar, no collection planned six months in advance. Why is that? Because our world is based on intuition, emotion and inspiration of the moment. Creating a unique piece requires …
Fez Embroidery: The Origin of Our Noon Collection
In 1997, Valérie Barkowski extracted a single stitch from Fez embroidery, enlarged it, and irregularly dispersed it across a white cotton pillowcase. This was the first piece of the Noon collection. Twenty-nine years later, it is still handcrafted in the Marrakech workshop, with the same technique, using the same thread.
Fez Embroidery: What Makes It Unique
Fez embroidery, or Tarz el Ghorza, is one of the most complex embroidered techniques in Moroccan heritage. Its outline stitch is created without a preliminary drawing: the embroiderer counts the warp and weft threads, starts from the center of the piece, and constructs geometric patterns from the inside out.
Its absolute uniqueness lies in the fact that the front and back are strictly identical. No attachment points, no loose threads are visible. The patterns – stars, crosses, arabesques – are impeccable on both sides. A level of precision few embroidery techniques achieve.
Traditionally monochrome, it unfolds in blue, garnet, green, or plum. However, this work was not found in shops. It lived behind the walls of homes, passed down between mothers and daughters, reserved for wedding trousseaux. Valérie Barkowski discovered it in this domestic, non-commercial space, invisible from the street.
“Upon my arrival in Marrakech, this embroidery captivated me – an absolute precision that conveys an impression of simplicity. So perfectly ordered, symmetrical, and impeccable.”
From Traditional Technique to Noon: A Deconstruction
Traditional Fez embroidery forms large, structured patterns that cover the entire surface. Valérie Barkowski chose to deconstruct it: she extracted a single stitch – a small eight-pointed star forming a square – and isolated it.
She enlarged this unique stitch, changed its scale, then irregularly dispersed it across the entire surface of a pillowcase, and then along the edge of a bedsheet. The result: an embroidery that retains the rigor of the Fez stitch while producing a radically different, airy, minimalist, contemporary visual effect.
This is the brand’s consistent working method: identify a savoir-faire, understand its internal logic, extract an element, change the scale. Not to copy. To reinterpret.
“I extracted the stitch, enlarged it, and scattered it. The impression is similar, but the result is entirely different. Noon embroidery is a personal interpretation of a long-standing tradition.”
Summer 1997: The First Pieces, The First Embroiderer
To produce the first pieces, embroiderers capable of maintaining the required level of precision had to be found. Valérie Barkowski leveraged the medina’s network. She found an association of women initiated into artisanal embroidery by Moroccan Catholic sisters.
The first embroiderer was named Rabea. She lived in Dar Bacha, a stone’s throw from what would become the V.Barkowski boutique. She had difficulty walking, a malformation. They did not speak the same language. But the first sample she delivered was impeccable: the stars were small, perfect, regularly irregular. Both sides identical. Not a single thread out of place.
Then Rabea revealed that of the sum paid by the association, only 32% was given to her. The discovery was brutal: an institution presenting itself as protective was siphoning off the wages of its own workers. This was the first lesson in a reality that would take years to fully unfold – that of intermediaries who capture a share of the artisans’ work, sometimes under the guise of charity, sometimes even within the team. Employees of the workshop, better paid than the embroiderers, demanded a commission from them in exchange for orders. This continued for years before being discovered.
From One Embroiderer to Five Hundred
This initial contact opened a network. The embroiderers of the medina work from home, a Moroccan social reality: for women whose family obligations limit travel, working from home represents access to their own income, in a country where the role of women remains, in some circles, confined to the domestic sphere.
Once the first women were found, dozens more followed. Each embroiderer works from home, at her own pace. The Marrakech textile workshop receives, inspects, and assembles. During the busiest periods, up to five hundred embroiderers work simultaneously for the brand.
Each embroiderer produces at her own pace, in her own style. This imposes a logistical constraint: a client order must be embroidered by a single person to ensure the visual coherence of the piece. Slowness is part of the system.
The workshop now operates on a smaller scale, with the same exacting standards and techniques.
Twenty-Nine Years of Collection: What Has Changed, What Remains
The Noon collection has evolved. The pattern has grown over the years, and this change in scale has a direct technical consequence: the double-sided Fez embroidery, characteristic of the original technique, becomes more difficult to apply to larger formats. Current pieces are embroidered on one side only. The design remains identical, the precision intact; it is the scale of the pattern that makes reversible work impractical at these dimensions.
The collection now covers hand-embroidered bed linen,duvet covers, sheets, pillowcases, and embroidered table linen, tablecloths, placemats, napkins. Always in white mercerized combed cotton poplin for bed linen, a coarser cotton for table linen, and linen available upon request. The embroidery colors are infinite: solid tones or multicolored assortments from our collections, or even a color straight from a client’s imagination who provides us with their Pantone.
What does not change: the stitch itself, the technique, the hand. And the increasing difficulty in finding embroiderers capable of maintaining it. The savoir-faire is less frequently transmitted. Wedding trousseaux, the traditional space where women embroidered for months, surrounded by their mothers and aunts, are now outsourced or replaced by machine embroidery. Embroiderers trained in the exact technique of the Noon collection become rarer each year.
“Twenty-nine years later, Noon embroidery is still as loved and purchased. But I see that the tradition is fading. The stitch itself is changing. This explains why each piece takes the time it takes – and that this time is incompressible.”
POLLUX Hand Towel
€ 65,00MEMBA Shower Towel
€ 110,00MEMBA Hand Towel
€ 65,00LAMU Bath Towel
€ 150,00LAMU Hand Towel
€ 65,00TRASS Hand Towel
€ 55,00TRASS Bath Towel
€ 130,00TRASS Shower Towel
€ 95,00What the Noon Collection Says
The Noon embroidery is the first collection of embroidered home linen designed by Valérie Barkowski in Morocco. It is also its guiding thread: it established the method, opened the network, and taught the codes. Everything that followed – other embroideries, trimmings, the AYA, NIL, YUMI collections – stems from this same approach: local savoir-faire, personal reinterpretation, and production that provides home-based work.
An object can endure through time when it is built on sound internal logic. The Noon collection is its longest demonstration.
→ Noon Bed Linen — V.Barkowski e-shop
→ Noon Table Linen — V.Barkowski e-shop
→ The Manufacturing Secrets of AYA Linen — V.Barkowski Journal
FAQ – Fez Embroidery and Noon Collection
What is Fez embroidery?
Fez embroidery, or Tarz el Ghorza, is a traditional Moroccan embroidery technique originating from the imperial city of Fez. It is constructed using a counted outline stitch, without a preliminary drawing, and its particularity is that it is strictly identical on the front and back of the fabric. The geometric, symmetrical patterns are usually monochrome: blue, garnet, green, plum.
How is Noon embroidery different from traditional Fez embroidery?
Noon embroidery starts from the same basic stitch as Fez embroidery, but extracts a single motif, an eight-pointed star, which it enlarges and disperses irregularly across the entire surface of the linen. Traditional embroidery covers the piece with large, structured, dense patterns. Noon is airy, minimalist, contemporary. It is a reinterpretation, not a reproduction.
Is Noon linen available custom-made?
Yes. Dimensions, embroidery color, and material (cotton or linen) are fully customizable. Simply send a Pantone or fabric sample to sales@valeriebarkowski.com. Custom orders are subject to an individual quote.
How to care for Noon embroidered linen?
Noon hand-embroidered bed linen can be machine washed at 40° on a delicate cycle. Air drying is preferable to preserve the embroidery. For ironing, turn the piece inside out and iron on the reverse side.
What is the difference between Noon, Kross, and Otis embroideries?
The three collections are based on distinct Moroccan artisanal embroidery stitches. Noon starts from the Fez stitch, a scattered star motif. Kross and Otis interpret other stitches and create different visual effects, more geometric, denser. All are handcrafted in the Marrakech textile workshop.
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