Cairo
— — a thousand years of city above a six-thousand-year river.
Not only on a wall.
“Cairo holds the Nile where the river opens into its delta. The Giza pyramids stand on the desert edge fifteen kilometres west; the medieval Islamic city, with its hundreds of minarets, stretches east toward the Mokattam hills. The river runs slow and brown through the centre, the same river that has run through every Egyptian capital since the beginning. — from the studio
Cairo, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
Cairo is Egypt's capital and the largest city in the Arab world, holding a metropolitan population of roughly 22 million on the Nile at the head of the river's delta. The historic core sits on the river's east bank, opposite the island of Gezira; the Giza plateau and its pyramids lie about 15 kilometres west, across the river. The Fatimid city al-Qāhira, the city of conquest, was founded in 969 AD by the general Jawhar al-Siqilli. The wider area has been continuously urbanised since the founding of Memphis around 3100 BC.
Islamic Cairo holds one of the densest concentrations of medieval architecture anywhere in the world: more than 600 listed historic buildings inside the walls of the Fatimid city. The Mosque of Ibn Tulun, built in 879 AD, is the oldest mosque in the city to survive in its original form. Al-Azhar Mosque, founded in 970, is one of the oldest continuously operating universities on earth. The Citadel of Saladin, built between 1176 and 1183 on the Mokattam spur, holds the Mosque of Muhammad Ali and looks down across the whole city.
The Giza plateau opens at 7 a.m. and closes at 5 p.m., with sunset visits extended in summer. Tickets cover the plateau; the interiors of the Great Pyramid and the Solar Boat Museum are separate. Khan el-Khalili, the great medieval bazaar founded in 1382, runs every day from mid-morning through late evening and is busiest after dark. The Grand Egyptian Museum, opened in 2024 on the edge of the plateau, is the city's largest single visitor draw.