Crafting the future: Irthi Contemporary Crafts Council

The UAE is a region rich in craft heritage. For many generations palm fronds have been woven into intricate patterns to make sturdy and beautiful baskets, rugs and mats, a traditional craft called safeefah that’s steeped with meaning and skill. Spanning the Middle East, North Africa and South-East and Central Asia, UAE-based Irthi Contemporary Crafts Council specialises in promoting and preserving age-old and highly specialised techniques like safeefah weaving, as well as talli hand braiding. Yet its mission is not to act as a museum but to keep craft traditions alive. Through a wide range of social programmes Irthi explores the strong craft culture in the MENA region, engaging and educating UAE-based and international makers about traditional techniques and empowering its skilled practitioners through new collaborations and market opportunities.

One such scheme is the Bidwa Social Development Programme, which employs over 35 craftswomen in Dibba Al Hisn on Sharjah’s east coast. It provides vocational training to women that work in the industry, aiming to show that, on an individual level, craft can be a viable career and, more broadly, a vibrant economic sector in the region. 

For London Design Festival, talented artisans from the Bidwa programme and new recruits have teamed up with 12 global studios to develop the debut Irthi product range. It follows collaborations with international designers for collections with Asprey and All things Mochi, but its scope is unprecedented. 

This launch includes four collections from its Crafts Dialogue programme, which fuses European and Emirati approaches to materials and techniques, and eight from Design Labs, a residency-like programme that pairs trainee and expert artisans from Bidwa with international designers to cross cultural and physical borders to create products together. 

Just some of the exciting products from this debut collection include totem-like stools by Abdallah Al Mulla and Pepa Reverter; hand-blown glass inspired by the Emirati landscape by Palestinian architect and designer Dima Srouji in collaboration with artisans from Palestine and the UAE; and vases, lamps and phone chargers that pairs Italian designer Matteo Silverio’s high-tech take on Murano glass with Fatima Al Zaabi expertise in clay merging hand and machine-made techniques. 

Reaching out to the next generation of craftspeople is also a key Irthi objective and its Hirfati Youth Programme introduces young people, aged 6-18, to the craft traditions of the UAE through hands-on workshops and connections with practicing designers. As well as home accessories and design objects, Irthi has also cultivated its fashion credentials through its Artisan Skills Exchange Programme and the Azyame Fashion Entrepreneurs Programme. 

Launched in 2016, Azyame is an annual year-long programme that works towards developing UAE-based fashion designers, through a series of workshops that include topics like launching a brand, ethical practices and market trends, in addition to one-to-one mentorship sessions with fashion consultants and experts. The programme also provides the participants with showcase and sales opportunities. 

The first edition of the Artisan Skills Exchange Programme saw fashion designer Rizwan Beyg, and his embroidery artisans from Pakistan, teach Bidwa’s trainees refined embroidery skills in exchange for soft skills training, and learning safeefah and talli techniques. 

Irthi Council’s approach is practical, inspiring and empowering – which is reflected in its entire output, whether working with rural female artisans or tech-savvy teens.