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.
I have always been interested in the spaces that we spend time in and how design impacts our lived experience. In this era of fast homeware, I am particularly drawn to rooms layered with passed along pieces and handmade objects.
Whether it is found, thrifted or created and regardless of minimalist design or abundant maximalism, I think that choosing thoughtful possessions not only benefits the environment and supports craftsmanship, but gives me a more rooted sense of place.
My Wishlist
Lapis Tumbler from Herat, Afghanistan Glasses were my first introduction to Ishkar and my mother has been a long term fan of Ishkar’s glassware. Herati glass is known for its mesmerizing vibrant and distinct colors, but more than that I love the individual shapes which serve as a reminder that imperfection can be far more unique and valuable.
Sultani Carpet in Midnight, Afghanistan This piece takes master artisans in Afghanistan around four months to weave from Ghazni wool, drawing on the age-old craft of the Kuchi tribe. So often, we see these designs replicated by other homeware brands with no reference to the historic significance and source cultures. I love that this piece is not only beautiful but supports the continuation of a traditional craft.
Afghan Box Camera by Birk FoleyThis photography book shares images by dozens of Afghan street and portrait photographers who have used the handmade instant camera over the last seventy years. What is interesting is that the mode of production is just as engaging as the result as the Kamra-e-faoree’s are unique and beautiful objects in themselves.
Seraga Napkins, Egypt These linen napkins are a favorite. Malaika’s embroidery school, Threads of Hope, trains vulnerable women so they can be self-employed and work from home on commissions. The label also works flexibly, so that each piece is a collaborative effort and each artisan can work to her own strength.
Ruby Wears:
This vest is hand-crocheted in Bekaa by Lamsa (‘touch’ in Arabic), a collective of Syrian and Lebanese women. Each vest takes two days to craft by combining traditional Syrian and modern crochet techniques from the artisans’ imaginations. A major reason I became interested in sustainable methods of production was because of embroidery, which, similar to crochet, is also historically a way in which artisans would pass along messages and express themselves creatively.
Tarq Charm Necklace, Jordan
This necklace is made by Tamara Hajjir, a graduate from the Turquoise Mountain program. I worked with Turquoise Mountain on a project a while back and was really inspired by the organization's work with local restorative projects that give opportunities to artisans in the form of training programmes for both existing and next generation artisans.
Ishkar Stack Ring - Bamiyan TurquoiseI had never heard of Bamiyan Turquoise before (its scientific name is Chrysocolla) but the colour is captivating. The artisans that create these pieces cannot be named or credited since the Taliban takeover, but the sheer fact that they are still able to practice their art and create such beautiful objects is inspirational.
“I love my glasses and my husband wants to buy me some more. But I’m concerned about supporting a regime which is so oppressive to women. I’ve neve...
Mathilda Della Torre is a designer and activist whose work focuses on creating projects and campaigns that transition us to a sustainable, fair, an...
One reason we wanted a physical ISHKAR shop was so that we could host events, talks, supper clubs, screenings, exhibitions, etc. A place to join wi...
We spoke to Niloufar Edmonds, the curator of 'Bound for Life and Education: Sara Eshonturaeva and the Jadid Movement in Soviet Uzbekistan' about th...
'My Pen Is the Wing of a Bird' is an extraordinary anthology of fiction by Afghan women writers, published in Feb 2022 by MacLehose Press in the UK...
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.
Our handmade shirts and soap stone bowls, photographed by Charles Thiefaine on the island of Socotra, Yemen. November 2021.
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 ...
When Afghanistan fell to the Taliban we immediately paused trading with Afghanistan. After much deliberation, we have now taken the decision to con...
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.
-
Olivia Rose Empson
- 06.10.21
Mosul, a city in the North of Iraq, is gradually remembering the steps to a long forgotten tune. Once a vibrant area with art, coffee shops and lo...
Lebanese-Dutch Carmen Atiyah de Baets is CARMEN’s co-founder, a multifunctional guesthouse, kitchen, gallery and shop in the heart of Amsterdam.
Sicily is famous for its street food, from freshly cooked calamari to crisply fried panella. One of our favourite Sicilian streets are Arancini....
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:
Ibi Ibrahim is an American Yemeni curator, artist, writer, filmmaker and musician.
Words by Shamayel, founder of Blingistan. Illustrations by Blingistan + Daughters of Witches.
How many of these five extraordinary women have you h...
We spoke with Blingistan founder, Shamayel, about the need for playful, bold, conversation starters that can change the narrative about Afghanistan.
We invited James Seaton, co-founder of TOAST, to cast his well trained design eye over our collection and to be our very first guest editor.
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,...
[replace_with_featured_image]
Fig 1. Babur gardens [source unknown]
Fig 2. One of the hospital's where Dr Jerry used to work[source unknown]
W...
‘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.
Give a child a packet of crayons and tell them to draw a fantasy island, and they might well conjure up the Yemeni island of Soqotra.
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.
[replace_with_featured_image]
Fig 1. Traces of Aleppo [source unknown]
Zaina Sabbagh bought her first wooden printing block when she was 14. Sh...
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.
Every now and then a short video or article pops up on our newsfeed which tells a captivating story about Afghanistan or Syria that has nothing to do with war. For a couple of minutes we are reminded that countries like Afghanistan and Syria are home to talented, energetic people whose lives are not solely defined by the circumstances of the country in which they live. It’s a nice reminder, but we return to our day, forgetting about what we watched or read shortly after.
Theresa May’s recent triumph as Tory party leader reminded us of a controversial decision she took earlier this year. Despite 2015 being the most dangerous year to date in terms for civilian casualties, she successfully lifted the UK government’s blanket ban on deportations back to war-torn countries.
When we set up Peacock House last Christmas, we only intended to sell a handful of cufflinks in order to fund a nice post-Kabul holiday. The response we received was phenomenal, and we sold ten times the number of cufflinks we initially expected to sell! What started out as a week of work for the young group of jewellers we were working with in Kabul, turned into five weeks of full-time employment.
The closing of the Greek/Macedonian border in March left 15,000 refugees stranded in Idomeni. This area became the largest informal refugee camp in Europe since World War II.
Stepping out of Beirut airport you are immediately hit by the smell of rotting rubbish. It is a heady reminder of the rubbish crisis which hit Beirut a few months ago. With landfill sites overspilling, rubbish lined the streets of Beirut, piling up in forests and river beds surrounding the capital.
Whilst European leaders complain that Europe is reaching a critical point where it can no longer absorb any more refugees, and concerns over immigration have driven the UK towards an ignominious EU exit - with a population of just 4 million, Lebanon is home to more refugees than the whole of Europe combined.
I have recently taken up carpentry classes. I have no talent for making things with my hands, and the few things I’ve been able to make are very poorly put together. But for three hours a week I saw, I sharpen, I sand and I hammer. And it makes me feel good.
Outre le blog de Peacock House, de nombreux ouvrages/documentaires de qualité soulignent différentes facettes de l'Afghanistan. Ce pays a fait couler beaucoup d'encre au sujet de ses guerres, dont il a été le theatre depuis 1979, mais a su aussi seduire ses visiteurs par la richesse de ses montagnes et de ses habitants. L'Afghanistan se découvre aussi sous un autre jour..
In Winter, a thick cloud hangs over Kabul as people light wood and coal burning stoves to warm their homes. As a result the last few weeks Kabul’s weather has been described by Yahoo weather as ‘smoke’. We left the polluted capital, for the western city of Herat for a restorative break and to visit Hajji Sultan, the head of one of Herat’s last remaining glassmaking families.
Until relatively recently in human history ‘blue’ as we know it did not exist. There is no word for ‘blue’ in Ancient Greek, Hebrew, Chinese or Japanese. As hard to imagine as it is, ‘blue’ was simply not a colour the ancients were familiar with.
Last night a car rigged with explosives targeted Le Jardin restaurant in Kabul. The explosion killed two people, and wounded 15 others.
Be the first to know about our latest collections, pop ups & collaborations
Use left/right arrows to navigate the slideshow or swipe left/right if using a mobile device
