It’s been a whirlwind for Beirut. Lebanon’s capital has spent the past twenty years trying to rebuild itself and its identity. I grew up in a city marked by scars of a brutal civil war, scars that could be found as often on buildings as on people. The dichotomy of Beirut’s architecture is an apt lens with which to understand the city. Its landscape is made of new skyscrapers juxtaposed with old buildings that are now partly destroyed. Amongst these are the Heritage Houses of Beirut. These houses are traditionally adorned with red-tiled roofs, stained-glass windows, high-ceilings and hand-carved wooden windows. Each house bears its own unique style and is surrounded by luscious gardens. Each carries a stain of this city’s tumultuous history. These homes have survived countless brutalities, including the more recent Beirut Blast (the third largest explosion in the world). Some are flimsy, some are broken but what matters is what is still. They are a witness to Beirut’s history and carry a part of our legacy - one that desperately needs to be preserved.
It all began with the Pink House. Shortly after the end of the civil war, my mother, Nayla Audi moved back to Beirut. As she rediscovered her hometown, she recognized the fragility of the traditional Lebanese houses and their lack of power against big real estate developers. When my mother heard that the Pink House was going to be destroyed, she launched a campaign to “Save the Houses of Beirut”. She couldn’t reconcile raising children to be proud of their culture in a country stripped of its own heritage. The campaign evolved and became “The Houses of Beirut”, simultaneously an art project, a children’s book and an ode to her beloved Beirut. She commissioned Lebanese artist Flavia Codsi to paint watercolors of seven traditional houses around Beirut, showcasing different attributes of Lebanese Heritage. The book’s story follows the journey of two young girls discovering their city’s culture. Today, each one of these houses stands still, in a different neighbourhood, of a different colour - and for a fleeting moment, Beirut is still as it was.
Every one of these Heritage houses has shaped me, especially the one I am lucky to call home. I grew up in the White House in Gemmayze, a few hundred meters away from the port. We only realised how close we were to the sea on 04.08.20, when the Beirut port explosion demolished our house. While going through the remnants of our splintered home, my sister Yasmine and I found a copy of the original print of “The Houses of Beirut”. While peeling through the book’s colourful illustrations, the houses of our shaken city stood still—just as they were before. We decided to publish a new edition of the book. We worked with Anis, one of the oldest printing presses in Beirut that had printed and hand-binded the first edition. They still use the same technique as 24 years ago. We also chose to partner with Beirut Heritage Initiative (BHI), an independent and inclusive collective, that aims to preserve the social and urban fabric of Beirut through Heritage preservation and restoration. You can read more about their impressive work here.
All of the profits from our sales are donated towards preserving our national heritage and rebuilding these houses. Our home is a tiny fragment of the larger oasis of peace and culture that has been broken in Beirut, but as long as these houses still stand, there still is hope. Each one of them represent our diverse, colourful heritage – one that is fleeting away. It is important, now more than ever to preserve what is left of our cultural identity.
Having worked with our artisan partners for almost a decade now, they consistently meet the high bar we set for them. But in our quest for quality, we have learned some rough lessons along the way.
A collaboration with photographer and model Skye Jones, our new ring collection harnesses the beauty and power of horses, while paying homage to the rich history of Central Asian equestrian traditions.
They call it the heartland of the Taliban. But for over 3000 years it has been Zoroastrian, Buddhist, and Greek — long before the Kalashnikov was invented.
Before Michelangelo, before da Vinci—Herat was already shaping the world. This ancient city sparked a renaissance before Florence—a place most have never even heard of, let alone seen.
Around 17,000 people once worked in the trade; now there is only one company left, with no apprentices. It’s hard not to feel misty eyed about the loss of this tradition. After all, it's a story we’re familiar with.
A shipment of one of our wooden Jali trays was recently held by Border Force. When we finally received the package, we unwrapped the packaging to find that Border Force had drilled a small hole through the tray.
Ruby Elmhirst is a creative producer, working with sustainable and socially conscious designers, artists and brands on unique projects across an array of mediums. Originally from London, her family lives between rural Jamaica and New York. This contrast has vastly informed her mission to promote opportunity, acceptance, education and diversity within design. For this edit she shares her interior wishlist as we get into winter and spend more time indoors.
For the Print Sale for EMERGENCY 2022, some of the photographers are offering one-off prints as NFTs, some for the first time!Including Matthieu Paley, Glen Wilde & Michael Christopher Brown.
On the 15th of August 2021, Afghanistan fell to the Taliban. As the world looked on, ISHKAR launched a sale of photographic prints to raise money for EMERGENCY Hospitals in Afghanistan. Like you, thousands of generous people contributed.
One year later the world’s attention has moved on. However the situation in Afghanistan is getting worse and worse. We’ve teamed up with an amazing group of photographers to run the print sale again. This is our opportunity to show Afghanistan that we still care. That we have not forgotten. This is our chance to direct crucial aid to where it is needed most.
Selma Dabbagh is a British Palestinian lawyer, novelist and short story writer. We asked Selma which ISHKAR pieces are inspiring her this winter. See here selection here:
Now is not the time to stop reading, talking and thinking about Afghanistan. The situation continues to worsen by the day. So we've put together a few actions that you can take to make sure the world doesn't turn its back on Afghanistan, when it needs us all the most.
This summer we will be hosting different pop ups on London's Columbia Road, home to some of London's best restaurants, street bars and independent boutiques. Combine your pop up visit with some of these local highlights:
How, we are often asked, can a box of six glasses made in Afghanistan, one of the world’s poorest countries, be sold in London for £80? In this blog post we aim to show you who gets what and why.
This is the time for facts, not fear. This is the time for science, not rumours. This is the time for solidarity, not stigma. We are all in this together, and we can only stop it together.
A guest blog by Lucy Fisher I would like to hazard a guess that the first image which comes to mind when asked to think of Afghanistan is probably not a garden in full bloom, carefully tended to by a team of dedicated local gardeners. Despite the horrific turmoil...
A guest blog by Louis Prosser After almost four years of incalculable destruction and suffering in Yemen, you might think that the last sparks of beauty and creativity had been crushed. You would be wrong.Ibi Ibrahim is a 31-year-old artist working mainly in photography and film. He is Yemeni,...
‘I don’t care if you’re in Timbuktu,’ we might say. ‘You’ll be here tomorrow or else!’ Or perhaps, ‘He’s flirted with every girl from here to Timbuktu!’ It means something like God Knows Where, or A Million Miles Away.
'Bebinin, bebinin,' insisted Parsa. I was in the royal city of Esfahan, which the Persians call 'nesf-e jahan' ('half of the world'). In a cramped bazar beneath soaring domes and arches, I was in a world of carpets. 'Look, look: apache, apache!’ The word rang a bell (an American tribe?) but it took me a few seconds to see. It was a truly beautiful piece.
The Pin Project is an initiative ISHKAR launched on Kickstarter last year. We raised over £63,000 to provide jewellery training and work for displaced people living in Burkina Faso, Turkey, Jordan and Afghanistan.
As humans, we crave order. For many, productive work provides this structure. The world around us might be chaotic. But with work we can, at least at times, control what we do in a way we are rarely able in other parts of life.
At the beginning of this year, Flore and I found ourselves at the world trade fair for homewares, Maison et Objet in Paris. After a morning of walking through the colossal trade halls we were quite frankly bored of looking at objects. We were just about to escape and get a coffee when we came across Sebastian Cox’s stand.
Once a hipster trend, the desire for handmade goods has become thoroughly mainstream. It can be seen from the meteoric rise of Etsy, right through to proliferation of the word ‘artisan’ on products ranging from shoes to bread. Handmade products tend to be more expensive, and by no means assure better ‘quality’, so what’s all the fuss about?
As wedding season approaches, we have been getting an increasing number of exasperated customers asking when our most popular glasses will be back in stock again. Well, here's the honest answer – we have NO idea.
I remember singing a nursery rhyme about Timbuktu when I was in primary school. I can’t remember what it was now – was it ‘from Kalamazoo to Timbuktu’? – but I remember the images clearly. A fabled desert city at the end of the world where Arabs and Africans would meet to trade salt and gold, and in the cool of enormous mud structures blue robed scholars would scribble marginalia in great gold embossed manuscripts.
Yet we would be wrong to think of crafts as a small sector at the fringes of the global economy. Far from it, crafts are in fact the second largest employer in the developing world, and have a proven track record of leading a number of developing world countries towards developed world status.
The World Bank has ranked Afghanistan, as the 177th easiest country in which to do business with in the world. Unfortunately that was out of 188 economies. Here’s a quick barrage of some more dismal figures… In 2014 Afghanistan’s economy lost a third of its value, and annual economic growth slowed from 14% down to 1.5% where it hovers around today.
