The retina – a fascinating detail of our eye
„The eyes are the mirror of the soul and reflect everything that seems hidden; and like a mirror, they also reflect the person who is looking into them.“
The Eye as a Window to the Soul – But What’s the Difference Between the Iris and the Retina?
In the intricate world of the human eye, two components are essential to our visual experience – the iris and the retina. Most of us have heard these terms before, but few truly understand how they work – and what sets them apart.
They are often confused with one another, especially when we speak about identity, color, or uniqueness. But they serve entirely different roles.
Iris – The Curtain of the Eye
The iris is the colored ring surrounding the pupil – what we usually think of when we speak of “eye color.” Often referred to as the rainbow membrane, it sits visibly at the front of the eye and acts like a camera aperture. It expands and contracts to regulate the amount of light entering the eye.
In bright sunlight, it narrows to protect the sensitive interior. In darkness, it widens to let more light in. While beautiful and expressive, the iris is not entirely unique to you – nor is it stable over time.
Retina – The Hidden Signature Within
The retina, on the other hand, lies deep within the eye, lining its back interior. It’s not visible without special technology. And yet, it is where vision truly begins.
Here, in a delicate network of rods and cones, light is transformed into electrical signals and sent to the brain through the optic nerve – allowing us to perceive the world around us.
But there is something even more fascinating:
The retinal vessels, which we capture for our jewelry, were formed in your mother’s womb. They never change. They belong only to you – invisible, intimate, and unrepeatable.
Even identical twins, who share the same DNA and look alike in every other way, have entirely different retinal vessel patterns.
That’s why we call the retina a silent witness of the soul.
Not just a biological feature, but a personal visual fingerprint – hidden from the world, yet utterly yours.
1. The Macula – The Center of Clarity
At the heart of the retina lies the macula, a highly specialized area responsible for sharp central vision. It enables us to read, recognize faces, and perceive the finest details – the kind of vision we often take for granted, yet rely on every single day.
2. The Optic Nerve – Gateway to Perception
All nerve fibers from the retina converge at the optic nerve. This is the channel through which light impulses are transmitted to the brain – where they are decoded and transformed into the images we “see.”
It is also the point where arteries enter the eye, bringing oxygen and nutrients, while veins exit, carrying away deoxygenated blood.
From a visual standpoint, this is often the most dynamic region in a retinal image – a richly woven area of vessels and contrast. This is why, when we create your jewelry, the area around the optic nerve often becomes the aesthetic focal point of your personal RetinaSignature®.
3. The Blind Spot – A Silent Absence
At the site where the optic nerve leaves the eye, there are no light-sensitive cells – creating what is known as the blind spot. And yet, we don’t perceive any gap in our vision.
Why? Because the brain seamlessly fills it in. A quiet miracle of perception we experience every moment – without even knowing it.
Conclusion: The Dialogue Between Iris and Retina
The iris and the retina each play a crucial role in the miracle of sight.
While the iris adjusts the amount of light entering the eye – like a curtain that opens and closes – the retina translates that light into electrical impulses that the brain interprets as vision.
To me personally, the sense of sight is the most profound of all.
It is through vision that I take in the world in all its richness, beauty, and subtlety.
And it is through the retina – this hidden network of vessels and light – that we capture not just what you see, but who you are.
Why Do We Use Your Retina in Jewelry?
“How did you come up with such an idea?”
It’s a question I hear almost every day – and rightly so. After all, using a hidden part of the eye – a seemingly medical detail – as the heart of a jewelry design is anything but obvious.
Let me take you back for a moment.
And I promise, you’ll understand why the retina became our material of choice.
I came to Switzerland from Austria in the year 2000, planning to stay for three years – just long enough to finish my PhD in neurobiology and return to Vienna to work in research. That was the plan.
But life, as we know, has its own quiet momentum.
I’ve always been fascinated by nature. I loved experimenting, observing, and losing myself for hours at the microscope, studying neurons – delicate, intelligent structures forming the intricate architecture of our nervous system.
The beauty of it was undeniable. A kind of biological poetry.
After completing my doctorate, I joined a large pharmaceutical company. The work was intellectually stimulating – challenging, even rewarding. But something essential was missing: the magic. The aesthetics of nature gave way to boardroom metrics, and the wonder I once felt began to fade.
At that time, I had just married – and helped my wife open her own jewelry atelier in Basel. Through her, I discovered a different world: a world where beauty, craftsmanship, and personal expression mattered deeply.
And I saw something profound:
Science and art weren’t opposites.
They could be in dialogue.
Back then, I discovered two things I hadn’t expected to enjoy so deeply: creative jewelry design – and entrepreneurship.
We built this company from the ground up, doing almost everything ourselves. It grew quickly, organically, and soon I found myself standing at a crossroads:
Should I leave my secure position in the pharmaceutical industry – and risk everything for something entirely new?
It wasn’t an easy decision.
I knew I wouldn’t be able to return to my old career if things didn’t work out. It meant letting go of a path I had prepared for over fifteen years.
But then again – we only get one life.
And I asked myself:
Why stay in something comfortable but unfulfilling, just because it’s familiar?
Why not try something that lights me up – even if the outcome is uncertain?
Spoiler alert:
I never regretted that decision. 😊
From the beginning, both my wife and I shared a clear vision:
We didn’t want to sell mass-produced designs.
We wanted to create jewelry that was personal – deeply personal – and offer each customer something truly unique.
We began offering bespoke pieces, and demand quickly followed. I immersed myself in the craft:
I attended masterclasses, studied traditional goldsmithing techniques, and expanded our collection both in diversity and in quality.
Later, I trained in computer-aided jewelry design (CAD) – bridging centuries-old artistry with modern precision.
Shall I continue with the next part – the exact moment the idea of using the retina came to you, and how it transformed your brand? Or would you like this section already prepared as a design-ready PDF story article with visual cues and typographic highlights?
Alternativ könnte ich die gesamte Gründerstory gliedern – z. B.:
-
The Scientist
-
The Turning Point
-
The Maker’s Journey
-
The Retina Revelation
-
A New Language of Jewelry
As we gradually began to focus more on wedding rings, one thing became clear:
We were not interested in ordinary designs.
The typical models offered by every jeweler – mass-produced, interchangeable, forgettable – simply didn’t speak to us. That was never our language.
What we loved most was seeing the fascination in our clients’ eyes when we created something truly one-of-a-kind for them.
It became obvious: our personal approach – both in craftsmanship and in service – was more than just a style.
It was a formula for trust. For connection. For success.
By that point, we had already established a solid reputation and a refined wedding ring collection.
But deep down, I felt it again – that quiet sense of creative restlessness.
Our customers were happy. And yes, our rings were handcrafted, high quality, and well received.
But still… something was missing.
I realized that, no matter how beautiful they were,
I could have sold these rings to anyone.
And that was exactly the problem.
They weren’t individual enough.
Not essential enough.
Not undeniably theirs.
I wanted to create something that could belong to one person only – something with a direct, distinctive, and deeply personal meaning.
An engraved name wasn’t enough. Not even close.
Fingerprints had been done before – but they always carried, for me, a forensic connotation. More police than poetry.
I understood the intention, though.
People longed to express their individuality – to embed a trace of themselves into a ring that would forever bind them to their partner.
We even experimented with palm lines engraved onto rings. A beautiful idea in theory – but aesthetically, it lacked structure. It didn’t feel right.
Even soundwaves – “I love you” rendered as frequencies – were fascinating in a conceptual sense.
But they didn’t resonate with my inner sense of elegance. They felt more technical than timeless.
What I was looking for was a personal signature –
but one that was also visually beautiful.
Something intimate, but aesthetic. Unique, but elegant.
And that’s when my scientific side returned – quietly, insistently – and brought me the answer I hadn’t even known I was waiting for:
the retina.
The retina is ultra-personal – as unique as a fingerprint, yet far more poetic.
The first time you see it, it evokes something primal and mesmerizing:
a network of delicate vessels, like the roots of a tree, or the branches of a river delta.
Sometimes the vessels seem to wrap around each other, like an embrace.
At times they even resemble hearts. Or symbols. Or abstract maps of connection.
I was genuinely excited – and right from the start, I had a strong intuition that this could be it.
The missing piece.
And then another thought struck me:
In almost every culture around the world, the eye is seen as the window to the soul.
So what could possibly be more fitting for a wedding ring –
than a visual echo of that very soul?
This delicate structure sits at the threshold between the visible outer world and our inner, emotional landscape.
And we had found a way to transform it into something timeless, meaningful, and wearable.
To this day, I still find it astonishing that no one else had ever thought of this.
That I might truly be the first – and perhaps still the only one –
to realize that these two seemingly unrelated worlds – retina and jewelry –
could belong together so perfectly.
It was no longer just about jewelry.
It was about creating something that had never existed before – a poetic technology of identity and emotion.
At the same time, I was still in the early stages of the concept – and we needed actual retina images.
I still remember the excitement so vividly. I was so taken by the idea that I closed our store during official business hours and walked straight to a large optician nearby.
I spoke with the manager, who was intrigued – but didn’t have the right equipment to capture the images I needed.
Instead, he gave me the name of a specialist.
I emailed him immediately.
He replied within hours.
I’ll never forget his words:
“A breathtakingly beautiful idea.”
He was fully on board – and just like that, we began capturing the first retina images: mine and my wife’s.
The design process took longer than expected.
For various technical reasons, the raw images required significant editing before they could be used for jewelry. But I didn’t mind. I was used to experimentation – it was second nature from my scientific days.
There were setbacks. Failed attempts.
But also the thrill of progress – and the unmistakable feeling that this could really work.
It felt like an adventurous journey of discovery.
Something between a creative experiment and a personal quest.
And so the journey began.
In 2019, I embarked on what I now call my international tour – presenting our concept at 15 trade fairs around the world.
From Zurich, Bern and Lucerne to Paris, London, Edinburgh – even as far as Abu Dhabi.
It was, without question, the most exciting – and exhausting – year of my professional life.
I was on the road almost constantly. But the feedback was phenomenal.
No one had ever seen symbolic jewelry quite like this.
People were moved, fascinated, curious.
And yet… I also met skeptics.
Some saw only the physiological side.
“Veins on a wedding ring? Isn’t that a little creepy?”
I understood their discomfort. The eye is, for many, a sensitive organ – and not an easy one to associate with beauty.
But I also knew:
They weren’t seeing what I was seeing.
This wasn’t about the bloodshot vessels we sometimes see after a long night.
(Those sit on the cornea – a completely different layer.)
No – this was about going deeper.
Quite literally.
You have to do two things:
a) look closer at the retina itself – its elegance, its structure, its silent complexity.
And
b) be able to abstract the idea:
To understand that what we’re working with isn’t just anatomy – but a hidden, unrepeatable pattern that carries symbolic power far beyond what we usually associate with the body.
This is not just a vessel.
It’s a visual signature.
A deeply encoded message – invisible to the world, yet utterly your own.
And from there, things evolved.
The first clients came. The first tears. The first wedding where the ring carried more than gold – it carried the soul’s echo.
What began as an idea became a language.
The Magic of Eye Contact
The eye is not only a marvel of biology – it may well be the organ that connects us most directly to the world around us.
Our gaze can be astonishingly expressive.
It transcends language.
Fear, joy, attraction, doubt, wonder – all these can be conveyed through a single glance.
Eye contact is far more powerful than many people realize.
This has been impressively demonstrated in social experiments:
Around 45,000 people in over 90 cities around the world participated in a simple act –
they held eye contact with a stranger for just one minute.
And the results?
Surprising, even for the participants themselves.
Many reported a sense of connection – deep, warm, and almost inexplicable – with someone they had never met before.
The experiment has since been repeated globally – including in Berlin in 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018.
Long before that, the “Eye Contact Exercise” gained international attention through a powerful performance by the artist Marina Abramović, who spent three months seated across from strangers at the Museum of Modern Art in New York – simply gazing into their eyes.
“While holding eye contact, you’ll notice different things happening.
Thoughts, emotions, feelings may arise – let them.
If you feel like laughing, laugh.
If you feel like crying, then cry.”
— Marco van Bree, Eye Contact Munich
The retina lies just behind the eye – unseen, but always present.
Perhaps that’s what makes it so meaningful:
It mirrors what we rarely show.
And yet, in a single shared glance, we are seen.
Eye Contact and the Art of Connection
It seems that eye contact plays a significant role in falling in love.
Intrigued by this idea, researchers once invited a lecturer to take part in an experiment. A year later, she married the person she had gazed at.
Eye contact is powerful – and intimate.
For many, it can feel uncomfortable. Even intrusive.
Why? Because in those moments, we open what is often referred to as the window to the soul – and in doing so, we become vulnerable.
But that vulnerability is precisely where connection begins.
When we dare to look into someone’s eyes – and to be seen in return –
we allow something real to emerge: a shared humanity.
A space where masks fall away.
A space where we can project, reflect, recognize ourselves in the other.
Everything we see in others often carries echoes of who we are.
Perhaps that’s why averting the gaze has become a modern reflex –
to avoid contact not just with others, but with the deeper layers of ourselves.
Because in that space, uncomfortable emotions may surface.
And we are not always ready to sit with them.
Yet those who participate in such experiments often describe them as not just challenging –
but liberating.
Intentional eye contact can become a quiet act of mindfulness –
a way to reawaken a sense of connection that many feel has been lost.
And right there – where the outer world meets the inner one –
sits the retina.
The retina is not just part of the eye.
It lives precisely at the threshold:
between what is visible (the gaze)
and what is invisible (perception, soul, emotion).
In a very real way,
it is the structure through which we feel seen –
and through which we see with meaning.
“We are like islands in the sea, separate on the surface but connected in the deep.”
William James
Any questions ?
We’d love to hear from you if you have any questions or if we could be of service in any way.
Feel free to fill in the following form and we’ll get back to you within 24 hours.
Chat here directly with somone of your team.