Shalateen Tales

1300 kilometers away from Cairo, we travel to the furthest place at the south of the Red Sea to meet with the Ababda women artisans, who specialize in tanning and braiding leather from scratch using only natural materials from their environment. They use "garad" from Doum palm trees, located in Aswan along the Nile, to naturally tan the sheep hide they get locally from the butcher. Then, through a month-long process of burial and soaking in natural oil, the hide turns into leather that they then cut into very narrow strips, then they braid it by hand, then they send it to us in Cairo, so we can make beautiful designs out of this very special leather.

This process dates back to ancient times. Many indigenous groups around the world still use this method to produce the most natural, chemical-free, strong leather that we utilize to be used in most of our products.