Zaatari Blog

Drawing Reality

The TIGER GIRLS of Zaatari share what they most want the world to know at this time – unexpectedly, this became what the COVID-19 pandemic has meant to them.

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VITAL SIGNS

These are both precious and dangerous times to commit anything to writing; still a time for feeling over pronouncements?

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DESIGN FOR HUMANITY – A LIVING CURRICULUM

Travelling between London College of Fashion (LCF) and Zaatari Refugee camp on the Syrian/ Jordan border these past 5 years has been a time of immense learning for me; Zaatari itself and everyone who lives there are teachers of the most extraordinary kind, showing us what resilience, innovation and sustainability truly are – everything happens through being in vital and reciprocal relationship.

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Nik D.
DESIGNER IN RESIDENCE 2020

London College of Fashion, UAL and the UNHCR are pleased to announce that Professor Helen Storey (Centre for Sustainable Fashion) will continue in her role as UNHCR Designer in Residence into 2020. For the past 4 years Helen has worked side by side with refugees living in Zaatari, one of the world’s largest refugee camps, responding to their needs and wishes and co creating projects which nurture entrepreneurship, creativity and financial independence through the lens of fashion.

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THE POWER OF MAKING

Since January 2019, Professor Helen Storey has been working with the UNHCR as ‘Artist in Residence’ at Za’atari Refugee Camp, Jordan. With a variation of projects successfully exchanging knowledge and empowering those in the camp through making. Helen’s work has enabled multiple developments including ‘Carving Time’ an exhibition in London of work by artist Tarek from Zaatari Refugee Camp, Jordan – on until 31 January 2020.

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Nik D.
SOME THOUGHTS ON VISITING ZAATARI BY ANNA FITZPATRICK

At the beginning of the year, Anna Fitzpatrick from Centre for Sustainable Fashion starting supporting Helen with her work in Za’atari. In February Anna joined Helen in Za’atari. Since then she’s been trying to making sense of herexperience. Here she reflects on the experience and the opportunity to understand more about how to live life in London and what needs to be done there to affect useful change there in Za’atari.   

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GUEST BLOG - SCENTS OF PURPOSE: FRAGRANCE AND SOAP PROJECT, ZAATARI ANNE LOUVET, GLOBAL BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT, GIVAUDAN

The true scale of Zaatari became apparent during an unexpected visit to the roof of the central water tower, the highest spot in town, accompanied by our UNHCR translator and guide. A vast expanse of barren desert, covered as far as the eye can see in all directions by groups of white caravans arranged into family compounds, agremented by corrigated iron porches and covered courtyards. Battered by the scorching dust of summer and the cruel cold of winter, these rudimentary container homes house almost 80,000 people. 

The barren exterior common to all the compounds is broken here and there by vivid graffiti, sometimes whole districts have a common theme - defiant colours proclaiming fury, defiance, hope - and beauty.

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Nik D.Comment
HOLDING THE OPPOSITES

Helen reflects on what 2018 has shown her and some of the new emerging aptitudes for her as a designer and Artist in Residence at Za’atari Refugee Camp in 2019.

This city of the future zings between all our opposites. 

Patience with urgency, trauma and joy, complexity with simplicity, between confidences deeply held, whilst gossip abounds, with what can be known, but not spoken of, to the most extreme manifestation – hope, in the same mind as despair. As if minds themselves, have developed new capacities to simultaneously hold and express these paired opposites, as one new emotion.

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Nik D.Comment
ZA'ATARI WISDOM - DEEPA PATEL - A REFLECTION

Helen and Deepa are longtime collaborators and have worked closely together in Za’atari. Deepa’s creativity lies in a core understanding of our inner worlds and she has a gift for intuiting what is needed to bring people together, facilitating uplifting and positive outcomes.

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PLANTING FRAGRANT SEEDS OF HOPE

Za’atari Refugee Camp – September 2017

A group of 24 Syrian women in Jordan’s Za’atari refugee camp have been trained in fragrance creation by Givaudan fragrances to help create new beauty products and local businesses. They are part of an initiative Helen Storey is getting off the ground titledB eauty co-op, enhancing the women’s, already considerable skills and talents, is part of a wider project to further develop new opportunities by realising their entrepreneurial skills beyond the camp also.

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Nik D.Comment