• Craftsmen have continued to keep ancient Egyptian arts alive.
• Mosaic designs are an integral part of the time-tested civilization of Egypt.
• From tables to chess boards, beautiful everyday items keep emerging from seashells.

In the Egyptian town of Sakiet Al-Mankadi, little wrecks of seashells turn into beautiful works of art after groups of creative men go through hassles to collect small shards of the seashells, and artistically employ them in the making of decorative materials. After years of diligently making arts from seashell, the town of Sakiet Al-Mankadi has become well-known for this seemingly growing seashell industry because numerous items produced in this town from seashells are stocked up in shops in the Khan Khalili bazaar in Cairo, and even sent out of Egypt to patrons from beyond the shores.

The shells eventually end up as embellishments on boards that are used to decorate walls. The craftsmen are an essential factor in the making of these beautiful arts. In sourcing the shred of shells, they develop an eye for aesthetics; they know what shell works best. Then they deploy the requisite skillset to transform the wrecked shells into artistic masterpieces.

But, beyond skill, another quality is essential: “you have to be patient so that you can create the design, a design can take an hour while another can take a day or even a month,” Kareem Saeed said. His workshop has continued to stand tall as one of the 40 workshops in the village where the craft is not only held high but also handed down from one generation to the next. Saeed went further: “you could say I was born here; I grew up here in my father’s workshop, in here I learnt all from A to Z.”

Designing in this type of craft has many stages that demand skills of cutting, designing and making the shell materials. The shells are collected and assembled from different countries including Oman, Australia, and sometimes Japan. The wood is from Domyat, or Damietta, a port city and capital of the Damietta Governorate in Egypt. A craftsman, Ahmed Ali, using a specific type of machine, cuts the shells into usable pieces for the designers: “I am an expert here on this machine, I cut the seashells for the workers in all the different sizes and shapes we need, “Ali explains.

A lot comes from this raw material. Among other things, furniture, chess boards, tables, and gift boxes are just some of the marketable items that can be made. The tools and other items used to make this traditional craft are not cheap.

Ammar, a craftsman who has worked in the industry for more than 40 years, is optimistic that the trade will get more recognition soon; he hopes for better acknowledgement of the craft pointing out that things had been tougher since COVID-19 and the attendant lull in tourism. “This craft is beautiful, I wish that the government and even the governorate would take more interest in it – especially the Menoufia governorate, because this industry here is considered a treasure in this governorate,” he says.

Creations from these pearls and shells are major items to be sold in Cairo shops. The craft is believed to be a durable type of décor, and this is gradually drawing people in from Dubai, Saudi Arabia, France, and Germany. The craftsmen also sell bespoke material designed based on preorder.