IT DOES FEEL HEMA!

It does feel Hema!… This is one of the reactions visitors of el Hema exhibition had; and to me the most rewarding. The whole shop is practically in Arabic and all the products, interior, photography have an Arabic twist into them. This accomplishment is the work of the whole team who worked on the exhibition. It is also a happy moment for everyone interested in design, culture and specifically Arabic typography.

El Hema logos (Left: new logo, designed by Wael Morcos. Right: old logo, designed by Tarek Atrissi in collaboration with Huda Smitshuijzen AbiFares. Arabic font used as basis for the logo is TheMix Arabic, designed by Lucas de Groot and Mouneer Al-Shaarani).

Arabic erotic poetry on uderwears, set in Fresco and designed by wael morcos.

24th of August was the “Khatt Kufi Kaffiya” symposium on Arabic Visual Culture, the official launching of the Khatt Foundation website and the launching and book signing of the Typographic Matchmaking book. Alongside these events, Mediamatic initiated an exhibition to team up Arabic typographers with Dutch design and culture. The exhibition of the El Hema store was to create an Arabic version of the famous HEMA Dutch stores.

The aim of the exhibition was the put the 5 new Arabic typefaces of the TTM project (Fedra Arabic, Sada, Fresco Arabic, BigVesta Arabic and TheMix Arabic) to applications (items and products) that are going to be sold in the EL HEMA exhibition; and to create a culture awareness and exchange between the Arabic and Dutch cultures. Some of the products produced were Chocolate letters, Chocolate bars, Chocolate sprinkles, Wine bottles, Coffee bags, T-shirts, Socks, Underwear, Scarves, Djalabas, Condoms and other stuff. The design team was supervised by Pascal Zoghbi, one of the designers of the Match making project.

Women’s underwear with the El Hema clothing labels. The tags are designed by Khajag Apelian using TheMix Arabic and the underwear is designed using Sada.

Design of the Chocolate letters wrappers designed by Wael using Fedra Arabic.

The El Hema T-shirts

The interior of the shop with the wine labels designed by Abrar al Musallem

The Chocolate bars designed by KJ using TheMix Arabic and Sada.

Chocolate and strawberry flavouried condoms package El Hema style by Abrar

Coffee, designed by khajag

‘I amsterdam’ campaign is the City ’s official English-language portal for Amsterdam’s international visitors, expats, students and enterprises. The adaptation of the campaign to Arabic is designed by willem velthoven and wael morcos

The exhibition poster on Amsrerdam’s streets

Line of people waiting to visit the El Hema exhibition/shop

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The following 2 pictures are taken by photographer Marieke Bijster

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The following 3 pictures are taken by the photographer gilian schrofer

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During the development of the El HEMA exhibition, the press took a great interest in the project and almost everyday we had journalists from Newspapers, television stations and radio stations come to mediamatic and interview us and have a look on what we are doing. Below is a list of some of the articles and interviews written about the EL HEMA on the following links:

Newspapers:
De Pres
Trouw
NRC Handelsblad
Amsterdam Weekly

Televison:
Channel 3
Channel At5
Zoomin tv

Websites:
Viva El Hema (David Garcia)

‘The foundation not only risked bankruptcy, but worse, unpopularity, De Hema is a very popular company in the Netherlands, it is how many Dutch people like to see themselves. To a degree, to pick a fight with Hema is to pick a fight with the Netherlands. But amazingly (and luckily for the organisers) the project was a spectacular success.

Rarely do cultural foundations operating on the margins, achieve this degree of impact. Not only did queues form around the block, there was also unprecedented and overwhelmingly positive, media coverage including substantial time slots in the television and radio news broadcasts and also a front page splash in the De telegraph, the closest the Netherlands comes to ‘populist’ tabloid newspaper.’

The Arabised ‘H’ of El Hema
cultuurenshow website

Kj speaking about the Chocolate bars that he has designed using Fedra Arabic and Sada.

Wael speaking about the white scarf with Fairuz song “Ya Mari’ 3al tawahin” on it designed by Kj using Sada Bold.

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For more info and links about the EL HEMA exhibition, please have a look on the following links:

El Hema on 29letters website

El Hema grand opening a success
El HEMA first days: huge success
El Hema late nite
El Hema – Exhibition / Store
Arabising El Hema

Explore posts in the same categories: Amsterdam, Arabic Type, Design, El Hema, Exhibition, Graphic design, Typography