Brass

Cairo / El-Zawia El-Hamra

"Brass making dates back to our anscestors since copper and brass were of the top materials that have been broadly used in ancient Egypt for a number of purposes, from building statues to crafting wonderfully detailed pots and jewelry. Today, even though the craft is not as popular or widely practiced as it was, copper and brass are used to create many favored items like pots, inlaid trays, candlestick holders, coffee sets, statues, archaic styled lamps, mirror frames, vases, decorative swords, jewelry and more. Ishak Fahim Rubel is one of those artisans who have grown up with the love of crafts running through their veins. He started out as an apprentice of one of Cairo’s better known masters, Sami Amin, he learned all he could about tanning leather and embossing brass early on. After spending 5 years in that workshop, he decided to launch his own line of leather designs. With a group of other artisans who also got to master the skill, he could build his name as a Brass maker. Today, Ishak has 7 people working with him, and he supplies his crafts not only to Fair Trade Egypt, but also to other galleries across more Egyptian governorates. Fair Trade Egypt started doing business with Brass Group since 2000. Since then, Fair Trade Egypt has been helping the group market and sell their products, as well as providing equipment to help them more in the making process. Ideas for designs are also frequently exchanged between both parties, in addition to the product development ideas we offered them. It also happened that we helped their products to be exported to UK, Italy, France, and more. With the years passing, the founder, Ishak, had adopted his own unique touch and began to design his own products."