Mezzing in Lebanon – Annabel Karim Kassar

₀₂ Mezzing In Lebanon, London, 2016 Installation

Installation

Around 50 SQM Each

AKK Architects recreated an authentic experience of Beirut street life with this installation at Somerset House for the London Design Biennale 2016, sharing the sights, sounds and emotions of daily life in the Lebanese capital.
In response to the Biennale’s theme of Utopia, the installation extolled the ingenuity and optimism of the Lebanese people.

Towering scaffolds enclosed the River Terrace of Somerset House to create the streetscape. The structure recreated the permeable façade of Lebanese buildings, punctuated not by windows and doors but rows and rows of gently fluttering curtains. Tangled electric cabling, street signs, and the overflowing barrows of street sellers completed the scene. The scaffolding also housed a small cinema and an installation of traditional shops displaying a typically incongruous assortment of wares. Stalls selling foods such as falafel, shawarma, orange juice and bread, an authentic barber shop and even a vendor of ceramic toilets were positioned shoulder to shoulder as they would be in Downtown Beirut.

Street seating allowed people to stay longer and absorb the atmosphere, sampling food and smoking narghiles (hookah pipes) just as the Beirutis do.

Mourad Mazouz, visionary restaurateur, founder of Momo Restaurants (404 and Derriere in Paris, and Momo and Sketch in London) and long time aficionado of Beirut served his own take on Lebanese food.

Annabel Karim Kassar commented: “The most crucial challenge is to evoke the feeling of Beirut, without masking the DNA of London which permeates Somerset House and every space around it. Rather, I would like to juxtapose the two cities; the installation will recreate the narrow, bustling streets of Beirut directly onto the wide promenade of the River Terrace and the Neoclassical façade of Somerset House. The most interesting thing for me will be to experience these two realities side by side and, perhaps, to learn something new about them through this interaction.”

PRESS

Parisian chic, Protuguese tiling, African wood and Brazilian marble meet the souk at an award winning architect’s London home.

INSTAGRAM

Throwback to London Design Biennale where @akk_architects recreated a Lebanese streets at @Somerset house • @london_design_biennale 2016 – 1st Prize – Most exceptional design contribution @akk_architects • #designbiennale #london #sommersethouse #design #beyrouth #inspiration #lebanesestyle #streetstyle #beirut #prizewinner #designbiennale #designlovers #designobjects #streetdesign #biennale #architecture #dezeen #architecturelovers

INSTAGRAM

Handmade traditional Lebanese mattresses #milandesignweek #energyforcreativity #Tripoli #internievents

As the Beirut blast’s two-year anniversary draws near, architect Annabel Karim Kassar contemplates the national tragedy with a partial replica of a heritage building she is restoring in the battered city.

THE NATIONAL

PRESS

The designer of the acclaimed Lebanon pavilion at the London Design Biennale tells us how she recreated a Beirut streetscape by the River Thames.

PRESS

L’installation que cette architecte franco-libanaise présente sur le parvis de la Somerset House, dans le cadre de la première Biennale de design de Londres, exaite “l’ingéniosité et l’optimisme des Libanais”.

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