The Traditional Jewelry of Egypt - Hardcover

Fahmy, Azza

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 9774167201 ISBN 13: 9789774167201

Publisher: The American University in Cairo Press, 2015

Synopsis

The story of urban, rural, and desert jewelry in modern Egypt, in a beautifully designed new edition

For many women of Egypt, their jewelry is their bank—they wear their wealth in their gold. But jewelry in Egypt is also more than mere assets, and its design and manufacture reveal a great array of styles and a high degree of skill and artistry. In this lavishly illustrated book, Azza Fahmy, herself a world-renowned designer of jewelry based on traditional motifs, lays before us an Aladdin’s cave of jewelry made in all corners of Egypt over the last one hundred years, collected through her extensive travels throughout the country.

From the farms and villages of the Nile Valley and Delta, from the oases of the Western Desert and the mountains and wadis of Sinai and the Eastern Desert, from Nubia in the south, and from the crowded traditional neighborhoods of Cairo is displayed a cornucopia of gold and silver adornment—each area with its own distinctive favored style. Personal seals have been widely employed, and there is even jewelry for special occasions, such as the appeasement of malignant spirits, and for animals.

In this completely redesigned edition of her bestselling book, in a new and elegant format, the author not only documents all these varieties and illustrates them with the finest examples, she also describes the techniques and skills involved in their production and the materials used, and recounts her own journey of learning as she apprenticed with the leading master jewelers to become the best known jeweler in Egypt, whose work is worn by world leaders, royalty, and connoisseurs of jewelry around the globe.

About this title

About the Author

Azza Fahmy was born in 1944 and raised in Sohag, in Upper Egypt. She graduated in interior design from the Faculty of Fine Arts in Egypt, became the first female apprentice to several of the best jewelers in Cairo, and studied jewelry craft at the City of London Polytechnic. She now makes and markets her own jewelry internationally with multiple stores, in Egypt, London, Jordan, Dubai, and at www.azzafahmy.com. She is the author of Enchanted Jewelry of Egypt (AUC Press, 2007), The Traditional Jewelry of Egypt (AUC Press, 2015), and My Life in Jewelry (AUC Press, 2024).

Edition details

• Publisher: The American University in Cairo Press
• Publication date: 2015
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 9774167201
• ISBN 13: 9789774167201
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 230