Expo 2020 Dubai’s Design and Crafts Programme has launched MENASA - Emirati Design Platform, which showcases more than 40 local and international designers, telling stories of the UAE through exclusive curated design collections.

Millions of visitors to Expo 2020 will have the opportunity to explore and experience traditional Emirati crafts and traditions through a contemporary lens, with MENASA featuring seven exciting design collaborations between local and international artisans and designers under the title of Craft Stories, and Designer of the Week - a showcase of 24 designers and organisations from across the UAE, highlighting the breadth and vibrancy of the country’s contemporary design scene.

Dr Hayat Shamsuddin, Senior Vice President, Arts and Culture, Expo 2020 Dubai, said, “The collective approach of MENASA, which means ‘platform’ in Arabic, is inspired by the theme and spirit of Expo 2020 Dubai, ‘Connecting Minds, Creating the Future’. By bringing together artisans and designers from the UAE and around the world, we are nurturing a rich cultural and creative dialogue that will contribute to a meaningful legacy after Expo 2020 closes its doors.

“The content that we are bringing to Expo through MENASA is innovative and intriguing, and will capture the hearts and imaginations of our visitors. We are very proud of this programme and believe that it will help to ignite a new appreciation of Emirati crafts as a contemporary and living expression of our cultural identity - locally and globally.”

Commissioned and curated by MENASA, Craft Stories is a dialogue between local and international designers and artisans who were invited to explore and represent Emirati crafts and culture in a new way.

A series of documentaries, shot on location around the UAE, will be exhibited alongside the design collections, drawing visitors farther into the intimate worlds of the artisans and their crafts and traditions, including clay, safeefa (palm frond weaving), talli (embroidery), sadu (bedouin weaving), gargour making (wire-crafted fish traps), pearl diving and coffee making.

Samer Yamani, Curator, MENASA - Emirati Design Platform, Expo 2020 Dubai, said, “Crafts have a special, innate power to communicate a local culture, a nation and its identity. Giving this power a poetic approach, we used Emirati crafts as a communication tool and merged it with design, new technologies and materials to convey more local stories and to intensify the experience for our visitors through our exclusive design collections.

The curated selection of designers and crafts organisations at MENASA - Emirati Design Platform is drawn from 11 countries, across four continents. UAE designers and organisations include Al Ghadeer UAE Crafts, Alia Bin Omair, Ammar Kalo, Bil Arabi, Irthi Contemporary Crafts Council, Khalid Shafar, and Tashkeel. International designers and design brands include BD Barcelona Design (Spain), Estudio Campana (Brazil), Iwan Maktabi (Lebanon), Klove Studio (India) and Nicolas Jebran (Lebanon).

The Expo 2020 Dubai reflects the UAE’s endeavour to build a more prosperous future for the whole world.

Expo 2020 will be the biggest cultural gathering in the world, presenting a visually striking and emotionally inspiring 182 days, as more than 200 participants – including nations, multilateral organisations, businesses, and educational institutions, as well as millions of visitors – create the largest and most diverse World Expo ever.

Expo 2020’s subthemes of Opportunity, Mobility and Sustainability will inspire visitors to preserve and protect our planet, explore new frontiers and build a better future for everyone. Expo 2020 and a host of its participating countries will be showcasing a range of developments that will change the way we live in the future.

Expo’s specially curated ‘Cities of the Future’ journey will take visitors on a tour to some of these pavilions to illustrate how thinkers, innovators and planners are using advanced materials, smart technology and big data to make citizens safer, healthier, happier and more productive.

Expo 2020 Dubai is expected to create huge tangible and intangible economic benefits for the emirate and the wider region. One of the first events of this scale to take place since the start of the pandemic, and the first World Expo ever held in the MEASA region, the six-month experience will be a beacon of hope for the global business community.

WAM