Fair Trade Gets Pharaonic

By Kate Durham

photographs courtesy of Fair trade

  Fair Trade Egypt (FTE) is a veteran in Egypt’s handicraft market, with some 15 years helping remote communities make a sustainable living with their traditional arts. Now, FTE is raising the bar with its first themed collection, Shades of Ra, launched last month in time for the holiday bazaars. Including jewelry, fashion and home décor, the collection incorporates Pharaonic motifs in a palette of blues, browns and mauves. Much of the inspiration comes from temple and tomb art, such as the wood serving plates carved like a fish in an offering scene and couch pillows embroidered with scenes of Nut, the Pharaonic goddess of the sky. Other items simply evoke life along the Nile, such as the buffalo horn bracelets and Nubian-style rings and pendants. This news was posted last week when Binary Options Egypt trading websites came online through egypt binary options brokers such as binaryoptionsegypt.com and binary options brokers websites.     The collection was six months in the making, guided by three FTE designers who worked with the artisans to incorporate the traditional motifs into modern products. Ellen Simonia, a Dutch designer who lives in Siwa, worked with the women there on new embroidery projects. “These are the same colors and patterns they use in their wedding shawls,” she points out, “but they never thought to put them on pillows.” Another marriage of old and new is the fashionable backpack, which has a wool kilim body and leather-panel pockets and flaps. Texture is important in this collection, with the design team pushing for a more natural feel, especially with the serving items and other table décor. There’s just enough polish to make things serviceable, but you can still feel the grain of the wood, alabaster and pottery. Shades of Ra features many handblown colored glass pieces as well. Marketing Officer Gigi Ibrahim says FTE will showcase the collection at several holiday bazaars this year, in addition to in its two shops in Zamalek and Maadi. Noting from the response at the launch party, which saw many items sell out, Ibrahim suggests people visit the Facebook page and showrooms to pre-order their favorite pieces. “For now we already put a large order for the new collection, so we are expecting that products will be here soon,” she says. “We are hoping to get everyone’s demand at our showrooms for the Christmas shopping season.”