ABOUT HoT
STUDENTS
ACTIVITIES
SHOWCASE
SUPPORT US
NEWS
CONTACT US
SHOWCASE
DESIGNERS
OBJECTS
THE SHOP
All
Aspen 2020
Elevate 2018
Design Miami 2017
Jungle Protocol 2016
Naked 2014
Confessions 2012
Céline Stephan Eid
Céline earned her Bachelor degree in Architecture from the American University of Beirut in 2008. Her final year project was granted the Dean’s award for Creative Achievement. She took part in various internships in Beirut, Paris and New York City between 2005 and 2008. After achieving her studies, she worked at DW5- Bernard Khoury Architects for five years (2008 until 2013) where she followed the different phases of projects ranging from Architecture, interior installations to furniture. Since then she has been working independently on various architecture and design projects she calls "Mécanismes". Few of her furniture were on display during the “Creativity and Regeneration in Mar Mikhael’s" event that was held in the abandoned Grande Brasserie du Levant last July. She also exhibited an installation piece entitled “Throne of Social Destruction” at the Beirut Art Fair ME.NA.SA.ART last September.
Christian Haas
German-born designer Christian Haas began his career in Munich. In 2007 he opened his design studio in Paris and in 2011 launched his own label. His made-to-measure designs are represented by galleries worldwide.
In addition to his personal design projects, he designs for renowned companies such as Christofle, Rosenthal, Villeroy & Boch, Theresienthal, Karimoku New Standard and Volkswagen. His portfolio includes chinaware, glassware, lighting design, furniture and interior design.
Christian recently moved to Porto, Portugal where he installed his new studio.
His work has been published in international press including Form, Wallpaper, Vogue, Elle Decoration, AD.
Claude Missir
Claude Missir studied interior architecture at ALBA and started working independently in the field since 1992. In 1998, he founded his company, Claude Missir Agency which conceives and executes esthetic, comfortable and functional interior spaces. His projects are spread in Europe and the Middle East. The luxurious hotels and boutique hotels that carry his signature are functional, fun, and innovative. He was distinguished for his numerous interior architecture projects for boats and luxurious yachts. Having become a reference for the decoration of private residences in Europe and in the region, Claude Missir knows how to deliver a supplement of soul and ingenuity to each of his projects.
david/nicolas
David Raffoul and Nicolas Moussallem are Beirut-based designers. Their unique way of blending retro, contemporary and futuristic elements gives their work a timeless aesthetic that translates to a wide range of projects, from furniture design, to high-end bespoke interiors.
The duo studied together at the Lebanese Academy of Fine Arts and the Scuola Politecnica Di Design in Milan, going on to found their own studio, david/nicolas, in Beirut in 2011.
Since then, david/nicolas has staged several exhibitions and collaborated with established international brands. In 2014, The New York Times selected david/nicolas as one of the three breakout stars of Milan Design Week, where they launched the bespoke “Artichoke” safe with Agresti for Wallpaper* Handmade, as well as their collection “Dualita” for Nina Yashar’s Nilufar Gallery. Later that year, their first industrial project, the “Orquestra” tableware collection for Vista Alegre, was awarded the Red Dot Design Award and the Wallpaper* Award.
david/nicolas work on multiple types of project, from collaborations with prominent international brands, to the design of their own pieces. They also help to realise the visions of select private clients, whether that means refurbishing a classic car or designing a custom interior for a high-end restaurant.
Dina Kamal
Dina Kamal launched her Beirut-based design practice, DINAKAMAL DK01, in summer 2010, focusing on unique ideas for precious objects and architectural projects. She trained and practiced as an architect in Washington DC and moved to Beirut in 1998, where she continued to practice architecture along with creating the jewelry brand in 2010. Passionate about her work, Dina Kamal is inspired by the details that make design timeless, and by simple refined forms. Her first jewelry collection: The PNKYRNG Collection, re-defines the shape of the signet ring through a contemporary and architecturally informed aesthetic; and sets its revival inspired by an elaborate history.
Elie Saab
Born in Beirut in 1964, Elie Saab is a self-taught fashion talent who started dressmaking at the age of 9. In 1982, when he was only 18, he opened his couture atelier in Beirut and started presenting his collections to an audience of young women before conquering the elite women throughout the Middle East. In 1997, he was the only non-Italian designer invited to the Camera Nazionale della Moda to present his couture collections in Rome. One year later, he launched his ready-to-wear collection during the Milan Fashion Week. In 2000, Elie Saab paved his way to Paris and showed his collection, then became in 2006 a corresponding member at the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture. In 2007, he set a flagship boutique in the heart of Le Triangle D’or and exhibited all of the brand’s collections, from the ready-to-wear and accessory lines to haute couture collections in the adjacent salons. Since Beirut remains his main source of inspiration, he established in 2005 his headquarters in downtown Beirut. Elie Saab continued to broaden his business internationally by opening boutiques in main cities around the world such as London, Dubai, Hong Kong, Mexico , Geneva and established a secondary headquarters in Paris located in Avenue Raymond Poincare. Today, the brand is available in more than 200 points of sale worldwide. Elie Saab’s unique designs are mainly inspired by women. He magnifies femininity working with the finest and most noble materials, applying delicate embroideries and creating characteristic aerial effects with light and fluid fabrics. Since 1999, Elie Saab has dressed Hollywood cinema, music, theatre and television A-list stars as well as royalties in the world. In order to share the Elie Saab brand’s femininity with more women around the world, he launched in 2011 his first fragrance, Le Parfum and recently introduced La Collection des Essences. Throughout his career, Elie Saab has been publicly recognized and honored for his success and contributions to the world of fashion.
Fadi Mansour
Fadi Mansour is an architect. He graduated from the AA School of Architecture in London in 2009. He currently lives in Beirut where he runs his own practice since 2011.
Kamal Aoun
Kamal Aoun is a product designer, product design teacher and product design enthusiast. He grew up in a family where toys, furniture and clothes were created and not bought. The carpentry and sewing workshops he was surrounded by became playgrounds with plenty of amazing things to learn and simple things to create. After getting a master’s degree in Product Design he started teaching cool students and working with cool people which are opportunities to continuously learn.
Karim Chaya
After graduating in Industrial Design from the Rhode Island School of Design, Beirut born Karim Chaya co-founded Abillama Chaya Industrial Design in 1997. ACID, which specializes in design, manufacturing and installation of architectural detailing, currently employs 170 craftsmen, architects, and administrators, and handles projects across the globe. In 2001, Chaya started spockdesign, a company devoted to furniture, product and as we like to call it, stuff design. He also actively contributes to Blatt Chaya, a family owned, traditional, colored-cement tile producer that was originally founded in the 19th Century. In addition, Chaya teaches fifth year industrial design at the Academie Libanaise des Beaux Arts. He has been invited to showcase in many exhibitions such as: 100% Design (London) and Maison et Objet (Paris) where his furniture as well as art installations have been presented. His work has been published in the local and international press including Le Figaro, Officiel Design, Monocle, Interior Design, and Interni.
Lea Rosa Kirdikian
Lea Kirdikian hates writing about herself in the third person. She does so only time to time to get strangers to momentarily glimpse into her existence on earth in a standardized way… which is quite ironic, seeing as she tries her best to stay away from standard rules. What she does in life is product design. Getting inspired from the anything and everything of life’s blundered designs and ready-mades, she thrives to break rules and fix the many errors of our daily system through simple ideas and natural materials. After completing her Master’s degree at ALBA, and after having failed at adapting herself to 9 to 5 jobs and their atmospheres, Lea decided it was best to start something small of her own. She then launched a very humble collaboration alongside her partner called Junk Munkez, aimed at teaching children the basic elements of design through reutilized and scrapped materials. She freelances with interior design projects now and again, all whilst continuing to integrate recycled materials as to reduce her carbon footprint as well as others. She partook in several local and international exhibitions of which Fiera di Milano at the Salone Satellite. Her products have been featured and published in a number of magazines in languages she understands and some that she doesn’t. One day she wishes not have to write bio’s of herself and have to have designed something grand enough to have people wiki her instead.
Marc Baroud
Marc Baroud is a Beirut-based designer, with work spanning over various fields.
In his method the process is designed first, thus turning it into a stand-alone outcome as it takes a form of its own.
Since 2012, he also serves as the director of the design school at Académie Libanaise des Beaux-Arts (ALBA) where he used his same design approach to shift the vision of the department with new curricula, envisioning design as broader discipline than how it is generally perceived; one for creating aesthetics.
As a product designer, his curiosity led him to experiment and challenge various materials, techniques, objects, and scales, working on a large scope of industrial and artisanal products. His works has been shown in Beirut, Milan, Dubai, Paris, London, including solo shows in Design/Miami and Design/Miami Basel.
Michèle & Georges Maria
Michèle Maria and Georges Maria are the dynamic duo behind MARIAGROUP.
Michèle Maria graduated from the American University of Beirut in 1999 with a Bachelor in Architecture. After having worked with Bernard Khoury for 3 years, she founded with her family the MARIAGROUP architecture studio, where she is currently a principal architect. Her approach to architecture focuses on the search for poetry in design and the element of surprise.
Georges Maria graduated with a Masters degree in Architecture from the Académie Libanaise des Beaux Arts (ALBA) in 2003, and co-runs the office as principal architect. He is particularly interested in the relationship between architecture and socio-economic dynamics and continuously pushes the practice into multi-disciplinary collaborations.
Based in Beirut, their studio now undertakes projects of various scales and programs, with the same passion and attention to detail, from retail and restaurants to mixed use buildings and master planning, with commissions throughout Lebanon, the Middle East and Europe.
N. Gholam & G. Crédoz
Nabil Gholam studied Architecture at the UP-Paris Villemin, ex-Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris before moving to New York six years later to complete his studies in Urban Planning at Columbia University in the City of New York. Moving from Manhattan to Barcelona, via southern China, where he briefly taught urban planning at the Yunnan Institute of Technology through the Kinney Fellowship, Nabil Gholam first began to practice architecture professionally at Ricardo Bofill’s Taller de Arquitectura, where as an Associate, he rose to handle the practice’s international projects. In 1994, he set up his own office in Beirut. Later, in parallel with the firm’s growing reach, a European office was established to better direct its international ventures, first in Barcelona in 2006 before relocating to Seville in 2010. Used to living in flux, Gholam has led a nomadic existence since the outbreak of civil war in Lebanon in 1975, his work and travels taking him on a circuit between Beirut and Paris, New York, Chicago, Yunnan, Barcelona, Istanbul and Seville and this constant crisscrossing of the globe has had a profound impact on his work. Today, nabil gholam architects has grown into an international multidisciplinary team of architects, planners, designers and consultants with a portfolio spanning an extensive list of projects in architecture and urbanism. ngª has attracted attention, winning several competitions and major international awards Guillaume Crédoz is an architect and a sculptor. To give a continuity to his collaboration to research labs in the universities where he was teaching, in Canada, he created the BAKERY in Beirut, a creation and manufacturing lab in the heart of Mar-Mikhael, the new creative industries district. Combining 3D printing with various crafts (like ceramic), he produces designs, from toys to chairs, machines and robots, like theObsessiveDrafter (a large autonomous drawing robot) and BigVoxel (a room-sized FDM 3D printer), along with his architecture practice.
Nabil Nahas
Nabil Nahas was born in Beirut in 1949 and went to the United States in 1968 to pursue his studies in art.
He completed a BFA from Louisiana State University at Baton Rouge in 1971 and after completing an MFA from Yale University in 1973 he moved to New York where he established himself before the current heightened interest in contemporary art of the Middle East, as a master of color, texture and atmosphere.
Nahas has exhibited regularly at important New York galleries, including Robert Miller, Holly Solomon and SperoneWestwater. He has exhibited at Galerie Tanit in Munich, Ben Brown Gallery in London, Lawrie Shabibi in Dubai and is represented by Agial Gallery in Beirut.
He represented Lebanon at the 25th Biennial of Sao Paulo, had a retrospective held at the Beirut exhibition center in 2010, Beirut, Lebanon and his work was included in “Glasstress 2011,” a Collateral Event of the 54th Venice Biennial, and in “Glasstress: New York” at the Museum of Arts and Design in New York His most recent one man show was held this year at the Ben Brown Gallery in London on October 15th, 2014.
Nagib Tabbah
A graduate gemologist of GIA in New York in 1991, Nagib represents the fifth generation of the House of Tabbah. A resolute perfectionist, his creations can be best described as wearable storytelling objects that won him faithful devotees around the world. A prolific designer, his laser-focused attention to details and inventiveness earned him multiple international patents and design registrations. Renowned for the sublime quality of his one-off privately commissioned pieces, Nagib more recently collaborated with Princess Charlene of Monaco to craft a necklace which she wore during the ceremony of her wedding to Prince Albert of Monaco in 2011.
Najla El Zein
Najla El Zein, graduate of the Ecole Camondo, integrated to Les Arts Décoratifs in Paris, is a designer based in Beirut since 2010. Her objects and spatial installations illustrate tactility, sensations, sincerity and complexity. Najla engages in an almost holistic approach to design by embracing long process thinking, vast experimentation and refined production. Each of her creations are locally and carefully handmade with passionate craftsmen and technologists.
Her work is in search of simple and raw beauties, derived from narratives, materials or simply the experiences it seeks to generate. Najla El Zein was exhibited and published internationally in museums, galleries, publications and fairs such as The Victoria and Albert Museum, Carpenters Workshop Gallery, Beirut Exhibition Center, Singapore Art Fair and the Boghossian Foundation.
Noor Fares
The face of fine jewelry today is evolving and one its brightest young stars is London based Lebanese designer, Noor Fares. A History of Art degree from Tufts University was a natural extension of her creative upbringing where she expanded her knowledge and appreciation of Fine Art, enriching her taste and informing her inspiration. She began to focus more on jewelry and started to commission her own pieces, leading to her taking courses at the GIA where she expanded her technical knowledge of crafting jewelry and precious stones. Noor’s passion for travel, fascination with the arts and different cultures are at the core of her jewelry designs which reflect both her aesthetic and philosophy. Since launching her eponymous label in 2009, the collection has been selected by renowned global stockiest including Dover Street Market, Browns and Matches in the London, WhiteBird in Paris, Net-a-¬Porter online and as from February of 2014, Bergdorf Goodman in New York City. After receiving much international buzz for her fine jewelry line, luxury leather brand, Tod’s named Noor Fares as its brand ambassador in 2012. Noor also continues to work on exciting collaborations – in June 2013, Fares worked with internationally renowned architect and designer, Zaha Hadid for a conceptual summer pop-up. Whilst continuing to grow her business, Noor has been able to balance her studies as a post‐graduate at the prestigious Central Saint Martin's School of Art and Design in London, where she will graduate in 2014 with a Master’s in Fine Jewelry Design.
Rumi Dalle
Today, Rumi Dalle has interest in compiling, gleaning, and collecting found objects. In her work, reference to the old is sometimes signaled through subject, medium and technique. She runs a workshop where her daily research on Victorian crafts and folk practices mirrors her skills and curiosities in often-intricate handworks. Usually experimental, her work connects with the audience as a stimulant to relocate forgotten objects and resuscitate numb senses.
Sam Baron
Sam Baron currently works as a designer for brands such as Vista Alegre, Hennessy or Dinh Van along the creative direction of the design area of Fabrica.
Sam Baron’s perennial re-readings and reinterpretations of traditional know-hows, handcraft or industrial, shrewdly interrogate on the utility of today’s material productions and the very existence of new objects. By anchoring his creations in an artistic and functional inquiry, without omitting cultural and historical narrations, Sam Baron places his outlook in our everyday life and its contemporaneity.
His work has been presented in several international recognized museum and galleries such as Cristina Grajales, NYC and Nilufar, Milano.
Sarah & Malak Beydoun
Sisters Sarah and Malak Beydoun were born and raised in Beirut. After mastering in Sociology in USJ, Sarah launched her brand Sarah’s Bag in 2000, bringing together her love of design and fashion with her desire to empower and work with underprivileged women. Her line of handcrafted handbags and accessories are designed around the skills of the 200 female prisoners and ex-prisoners she has personally trained and worked with over the past 14 years. In 2014, Sarah joined forces with her sister Malak, who, after 16 years of experience with the region’s most prominent names in the advertising and fashion industry (Leo Burnett, Aishti, L’Officiel), took over the role of development manager and designer at Sarah’s Bag. Today, the brand is carried by global online retailers and concept stores like Net-a-Porter, Colette and Matches London and has over 50 points of sale in 22 countries.
Tamara Barrage
Tamara barrage is a product designer based in Beirut, graduated from Design Academy Eindhoven with a Masters in Contextual Design. Interested in the way objects provoke our senses through their skins, forms and functionality. Constantly looking for ways to define a design process by manipulating, exploring and experimenting with a wide range of materials and textures.
Valentina Carretta
Born in Treviso in 1981, Valentina graduated from the Politecnico di Milano in 2006, after an experience of studying abroad at the Bauhaus Universität in Weimar. As early as 2005, she began collaborating with Fabrica (the Benetton Group's communication research center) as a designer and project manager working alongside an international, multidisciplinary team of young creatives.
Her experience in the design department of Fabrica has continued for more than eight years. Since 2008 she has also been working as a freelance designer, mainly focusing on product design, displays and art direction. Her projects include collaborations with companies such as the Benetton Group, Seletti, Roche Bobois, Bosa, Miniforms and Fabrica Features, as well as limited edition pieces for Zanotta, Galleria Secondome and Granville Gallery.
Empathy, memory, and the search for new languages in the use of traditional materials are some of the features that characterise her creations, designed to add a story, an unusual meaning or a little surprise to each shape.
Her designs have been exhibited internationally at the Triennale di Milano, Gardiner Museum (Toronto), MAD Museum (New York) , MUDAC (Lausanne) and at the Paris and Milano Furniture Fairs.
Vrouyr Joubanian
Vrouyr is a Lebanese-Armenian multi-disciplinary designer with experience in products, services, and systems. He holds a Master in product design from the Académie Libanaise des Beaux-Arts (ALBA) and a Master in design for social impact from the University of the Arts in Philadelphia. He is currently a faculty member in ALBA’s Design department, where he co-leads the first year graduate design studio in the Global Design Program. His name being historically difficult to pronounce, he often goes by simply “V”.
SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER
CAPTCHA
Press Enter to submit