The past is never behind me it just evolves into new forms. This first photo of myself and my brother is from 2022, taken from our first editorial feature after the rebrand. In it, I’m wearing a body-painted whim of a blazer I made the night before and shoes I would rather forget. After my talk with Ramzi during this design week, and as I was rushing out of Tamara Haus later that evening, Moody stopped me and said “Hey! You’re wearing your rug! I love it!”. I didn’t have the moment to tell him that I travelled from 2022…the chauffeur was speaking reptilian into my ear piece and I was sweating a storm.
PRIMAL INSTINCT | BENEATH THE SAME SKY
The inkblot decides to reveal. Bosaina Studio and Emma James translate what we hide into what we see, tension rendered in deep black and visceral blue, sun and moon cycles woven into textile truth. One explores the duality of instinct through symmetry and shadow. The other lights up shared human experience beneath universal celestial bodies. Both refuse the comfort of concealment. Instead, they demonstrate that acknowledging what lies beneath transforms hiding into revelation. What we brush under becomes what we stand on.
Substrata shapes everything above it. Brush it Under The Rug, @cairo.design.week 2025.
@bosainastudio@emmaajames
WHAT LIES BENEATH | BRUSH IT UNDER THE RUG
On opening night, seven Egyptian designers reveal what design practice rarely admits, the doubt that sharpens vision, the rejection that deepens resolve, the psychological weather that shapes every line before it reaches the page.
Each rug inscribed with internal landscapes, woven into 150 years of craft tradition. In an industry governed by glossy surfaces, we turn attention downward. To the ground we stand on, the histories we inherit, the anxieties we metabolize into form. Vulnerability as precision instrument. Failure as raw material. Legacy as living practice. What distinguishes mastery from mere competence? Often, it is the willingness to reveal rather than conceal.
Featuring: @bosainastudio@emmaajames@kanjodesign@karimmekhtigian@m_fares@ramzi.humannature@yasminamakram
1908 Courtyard, Korba, Heliopolis
