Since 1969, Azza Fahmy Jewellery has become one of the foremost luxury jewellery brands in Egypt and has also won international recognition as a leading design name in the Middle East. With stores across Egypt, Bahrain, Jordan and the UAE, aswell as her online presence at La Maison Couture, Azza Fahmy boasts a diverse client list attracting jewellery connoisseurs from around the world.
“My long journey with jewellery-making all started with a book” says Azza Fahmy.
It all began when Azza Fahmy, a BA in Interior Design, came across an art book about the classical jewellery of Medieval Europe at an Egyptian book fair. She had been planning a second degree in the Applied Arts Department of the Faculty of Fine Arts, but she now discarded this plan in favour of a practical training in jewellery making. She became an apprentice in Khan El Khalili, learning with one of the craft’s most respected masters.
It was cultural and socially unacceptable for a fine arts graduate with a respectable job in the government to work as an apprentice in a workshop but Azza Fahmy had found her goal in life. She says: “I tied my hair back, put on my overalls and spent my days in a workshop full of men learning the tricks of jewellery making. My apprenticeship period in Khan El Khalili was two years that I recall with nostalgia and affection.” Azza Fahmy was the first woman to train with masters in the jewellery quarter in Khan El Kalili where she learnt ancient techniques and began perfecting her own designs.
Her real chance came in the mid-1970’s when the British Council awarded her a fellowship to study jewellery craft at the City of London Polytechnic. There, she completed her education by acquiring the principles and theoretical aspects of jewellery manufacture. Fahmy returned to Cairo with wider horizons and greater confidence as a jewellery maker. By the early 1980’s she had set up her own workshop with a staff of two.
In 1981 she opened her first store and seven years later this had increased to five in Egypt. She now has a further nine across the Middle East and UAE together with a number of store within stores and a substantial export business.
In 2002 Azza opened her factory complete with design studio and now has over 180 employees.
Egypt’s newest luxury multi-national brand, Azza Fahmy, set her sights on Europe and in 2006 began a collaboration with leading British fashion designer, Julien Macdonald, OBE who she found shared a similar design ethos. The creative duo designed a 2- piece bespoke hand crafted jewellery collection for his London Fashion Week Show in 2007.
2007 also saw her launch her first book ” Enchanted Jewellery of Egypt” which celebrates Egypt’s rich jewellery heritage over the last century. It delivers an in depth vision to Egyptian jewellery design uniquely covering every Egyptian region.
Following on the success of their first collaboration in 2007 Azza and Julien worked on their second collection for his 2008 LFW show. This resulted in a stunning and sophisticated hand made 13 piece collection that cleverly mixed culture, art and jewellery design and which retailed in the Spring of 2008.
Azza embarked on a second collaborative partnership with fashion duo, Preen launching the collection in New York fashion week in February 2010. Followed by a further two jewellery collections with Matthew Williamson in 2013 and 2015.
Azza Fahmy also sits on a panel of business professionals put together by the Egyptian Government with a focus on an initiative to enhance training and development skills to benefit the future of the country’s design and manufacture capability.
At La Maison Couture we are delighted to offer the widest selection of Azza Fahmy Jewellery available to buy online.
Shop our extensive selection of Azza Fahmy Jewellery at La Maison Couture
