Stephenson’s Pharmacy: A Hidden Gem in Downtown Cairo

There is something truly unique about downtown Cairo. Wandering around the streets is like a walk down memory lane back to an era of opulence and beauty. Downtown Cairo is filled with hidden gems, whether a very old café, or a small yet attractive shop hidden in a corner, the beauty of architecture demonstrated in its building; every corner around downtown narrates a story of rich history. 

 

This time, we are going to tell the story of Stephenson’s Pharmacy. Dating back to 1899, Stephenson’s Pharmacy is part of a British chain and was owned by George Stephenson. The inside wood cabinets and shelves were made in England after they have taken measurements of the pharmacy and brought them back to Egypt for installation. In this pharmacy, they used to make the blends of medicines themselves. They had all the needed equipment, containers, bottles, and tools.

In early 1940s, Dr. Ehsan Samaan bought the pharmacy from the owner George Stephenson. Dr. Ehsan fell in love with the place and admired all the details of it that he kept everything in it as is to date and he passed this pharmacy down to his son, Zuhair Samaan. 

Today, this pharmacy is much more than a place where you pass by to buy some medicines, it is more like a museum with the precious belongings it still holds between its walls until today. They kept old bottles of formulas, old advertisements, and tools they used to formulate different types of medicines. It also had a very old notebook that had kept details about the blend, the doctor who prepared it with exact measurements, and the name of the medicine.