For centuries this forgotten mountain village close to the border with Yemen was a major trading post on the route from Aden to the souks of Saudi Arabia and beyond. Camel trains bought goods here from the Far East and India where they were sold for onward dispatch. As the village grew rich magnificent fortified towers crept up the mountainside looking uncannily like modern apartment buildings. The buildings made from stone quarried from the mountainside were decorated with pieces of snow white quartz. The village and surrounding mountainside is home to at least ten tribes known as the Flowermen because both men and women wear colourful floral garlands on their heads. Rijel Almaa is soon to be designated a world heritage site for its culture and unique architecture and is gradually being restored. This August it hosted the first annual Flowerman festival celebrating the area’s musical and dance heritage, a sign that the Saudi government is allowing its people more freedom than they have had for at least a generation. Only a few outsiders have visited this magical place. My photographs were taken on an ancient Leica rangefinder using 35mm black and white film. I am also adding a few colour shots taken on my iphone. As anyone who has been too Saudi Arabia knows it is a monochrome culture with men dressed in white and women covered from head to toe in black. Asir province is a complete contrast to the rest of Arabia, the only place it regularly rains, home to the highest mountains in the region and to the most colourfully-dressed people you could ever meet. These black and white photographs of Arabia in Technicolor were taken on a 1932 Leica II using 35mm Ilford film. .