Scene | س : a brand coming out of Beirut

Original Calligraphy or Illustration silkscreened on the T-shirts or bags

Came to my mind, that I presented my new business venture/ Brand on my other design blog, but not in here, My-I-Love-Beirut-Even-though-I-rant-Blog, so here it is, ladies and gentlemen, my baby brand, joining together my love for design and my addiction to Beirut on a t-shirt or on a timeless bag : Scene | س

The Facebook group:
https://www.facebook.com/SceneBeirut

The online shop:
https://secure.blomming.com/mm/SceneBeirut/items

The website: www.scenebeirut.com

The Souraty Stop - An Urbanism/ Design proposal comes out of video documentation

Frame from the video at the exhibition of
 the Projects at Laboratoire d'Art Galery - Gemmayze

While you can stop any bus anywhere you stand, It seems that in Hamra we have three self emerging Bus Stops: One near Barbar Hamra, One facing the Tourism Ministry and one on Souraty Street corner with Cairo street, with each serving different bus routes.

Taking The Souraty Street as exemple, where van number 4 and bus number 8 stop and servees taxi cars are plenty, we filmed the activity there for a couple of hours:

Analyzing the footage, we found that indeed people gather there to take public transport: there is the usuals who hop on directly knowing bus numbers and destinations, and those who stand there gazing and asking questions and directions if the driver is kind enough to answer. Crossing on red lights is very common and laying back on the concrete stones helps during the waiting time.

Thus, the mini-proposal we came to. On Souraty Street, just after the crossroad with Cairo street, there is a small parking lot, that could very well become a branded Hamra Bus Stop, with benches for the old or tired, navigational maps and bus numbers panels with routes for better efficiency and less hassle, giving the people more confidence in using the public transport system.

Exhibition of the Projects at Laboratoire d'Art - Gemmayze

Frame from the video at the exhibition of the
Projects at Laboratoire d'Art Galery - Gemmayze

Exhibition of the Projects at
Laboratoire d'Art - Gemmayze

The proposal by Lynn Zarif and myself

3 months after the rePLACE Beirut workshop

 During the rePLACE Beirut project, I took some close-up portraits of the political candidates posters of Rmeil and Geitawi; the Blues Collection.
At the same time, I wanted to frame the faces for the public to "see" them because they are becoming unseen decor from the street - until they fade out completely. So I Framed, with tape, a series of portraits, a bit more then a couple of months later, this is the result.

The rePLACE Beirut Open Studio Day

Christophe Katrib's Route Hijacking Public Space

George Haddad's impossibility of a straight line

The Wonderful 3 organizers: Elaine, Fotini and Daniel.

Christophe seeing Lynn Kodeih's Route

April 16th, the rePLACE Beirut project concluded its workshop with a work-in-progress presentation of activities organized over the course of a two-week exploration of the city by way of the everyday routes of its residents (see www.re-place.info). Via overlapping discussions, documentation and hours of walks through the city, participants developed individual and group projects to reflect and react upon or make imaginary propositions for the city of Beirut. We began with a failed map in order to find a course for divergence, whereby tracing routes left by others becomes an impossible task: the map is lost after a coffee break in Achrafieh, the workweek/weekend population divide on bus no. 2 changes the landscape completely, and our memories bleed all over Hamra in a way that diffuses place into an overflow of gestures and signifiers. The resulting set of detours are informed with a very Beiruti sensibility; they are landmarks not as monumentalized structures, but as tools for navigation and agency within the archive. Here, the archive is the flow of Beirut itself. (text via the organizing team)

rePLACE BEIRUT workshop participants:::
Sivine Ariss
Lara Atallah
Jad Baaklini (Jad's article about rePLACE on Hibr here)
Maral Der Boghossian
Paul Gorra
George Haddad
Elaine W. Ho
Christophe Katrib
Céline Khairallah
Lynn Kodeih
Fotini Lazaridou-Hatzigoga
Lina Sahab
Tayfun Serttaş
Mikolaj Starowieyski

I guess Lina's picture turned out to be quite nice.

Maral Der Boghossian route from Mar Mikhael to her father's shop in Bourj Hammoud

My Route Focusing on Fading to Blue Posters and Seats in Geitawi

When I first discovered the project, I submitted my route here, many of the submitted photos already exist in the blog, since it really is a route I take daily and an area I appreciate and love wandering around. I invite you to submit your routes, sharing your personal Beirut.