Incollect Magazine - Issue 9

Incollect Magazine 19 Béatrice Saint-Laurent, founder, Galerie BSL. Since its inception in 2010, Galerie BSL has continuously promoted the breaking down of boundaries between arts, disciplines, traditions, and practices. For Béatrice Saint-Laurent, creation is a pacifying force, and this is also reflected in the multicultural dimension of her gallery. It thus continues to forge new perspectives, both in enriching the dialogue between the works and in the development of its production activities. Photo courtesy of Galerie BSL. Nada Debs is one of the most renowned designers in the Near and Middle East. For her, craft is an ideal vehicle for uplifting communities, preserving ancient knowledge, and bringing people together across borders, timelines, and identities. It is an approach she calls “handmande and heartmade,” which draws on her own transcontinental experiences — from her upbringing in Japan and her training at the Rhode Island School of Design in the US, to her early career in the US and the UK. Nada Debs was awarded ‘Grand Prix d’Honneur du Design’ by the Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris last year. Photo: Yasmina Hilal. Meher Asad, a graduate of the Pratt Institute in NYC, is the artistic director of Pakistan-based Studio Lél, which for thirty years has been committed to preserving and reinterpreting the art of stone inlay, working with local artisans and master craftsmen refugees from Afghanistan. Meher Asad is dedicated to perpetuating the legacy of the applied arts by infusing them with a contemporary aesthetic. She has brought Studio Lél, the artistic collective that her mother Farhana founded thirty years ago in Peshawar, Pakistan, to international recognition. In 2019, she received an award from the Gates Foundation. In 2023 and 2024, she exhibited with Homo Faber in Milan and Venice, Italy. Photo courtesy of Galerie BSL. “My work is driven by a belief in the power of design to cross time and border and touch us on a primal level.” — Nada Debs “Very few designers have reinterpreted craft for the contemporary audience the way Nada has. I can relate to her journey as a female designer.” — Meher Asad “The Gandhara Carapace collection was born from the collaboration between three women: Nada Debs, Meher Asad and me. For Nada, as well as for me, design is not just about form and function. We also believe in objects that weave connections, establishing a bond with both the viewer and the user. These are objects with a soul; they are, in this sense, true works of art.” — Béatrice Saint-Laurent Galerie BSL (Paris) booth shot at Design Miami 2023, where the Gandhara Carapace collection was unveiled. Photo courtesy of Galerie BSL.