Artisanal Cement Tiles Inspired by Modernist Homes
If Indiana Jones took a turn toward the elegant and developed an obsession with textiles, he might be a bit like Louis Barthélemy, the French illustrator and designer who travels to Africa and the Middle East to work with weavers and craftspeople who are skilled in traditional techniques. Ishkar, a London-based company that collaborates with NGOs and artisans to create job opportunities for those living in isolated areas of countries often affected by war, recently commissioned him to create a capsule collection with women weavers in Afghanistan. Barthélemy typically works with artisans in person to create tapestries or rugs but, since the Taliban retook power in 2021, he’s had to connect with the weavers remotely. At the start of their collaboration, Barthélemy asked the weavers to draw a place that symbolized beauty to them. Many of the women chose the 14th-century Bagh-e Babur (Babur’s Garden) in Kabul. Images from those drawings, and one by Barthélemy himself, were then combined to create the patterns for three different rugs. Each one took about six months for the women to hand knot from Ghazni Wool. They are, Barthélemy says, “a collective dream of an ancient paradise.”