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Luna BuGhanem
لونا بوغانم









Intricate Iridescence: Resourcefulness and Adaptation with
Nacre
in the 19th Century Eastern Mediterranean

Occidental demand for inlaid goods peaked in 19th century Damascus despite an economic crisis caused by rising cheaper industrial products. To demonstrate how the craft of nacre inlay survived the time’s changing circumstances, I synthesize insights from material sciences, migration studies, Ottoman history, archaeology, museum inventories, craft encyclopedias, and consular reports.

(Re-)Re-Imagining the Craft of Inlay: Contemporary Designs and their Historical Echoes


This piece challenges the nostalgic claims of contemporary mother-of-pearl furniture designers by demonstrating how re-imagining the craft of inlay is more than a recent phenomenon. In fact, the supply, production, and circulation of nacre inlaid objects have been historically re-imagined, defying demarcations between “East and West,” “tradition and innovation,” and even “homeland and diaspora.”

Elusive Histories, Specific Stories: Trips to Beirut’s Al-Basta Antiques Market


An oral history project in the antiques stores of Al-Basta that document the biographies and nostalgic impetuses of some of its clients, dealers, and artisans. In the market, nostalgia is more than just an attachment to the past: it is a way to reminisce, imagine stories about objects, a tool to restore or transform artifacts, a way to make a livelihood, or to keep a family business.

Travel, Orientalism, and Colonialism in Michel Écochard’s L’Autre


The essay takes Michel Écochard’s
L’Autre
—a self-published book of poems, reflections, drawings, and sketches from the architect’s travels between 1929 to 1978—as insight into his influences, attitudes, and design decisions. The reading of the text is carried out through three notional actions: unbinding, re-shuffling, then juxtaposing its pages.

Making and Unmaking Qasr el-Azem (1922–46): Archeology, Architecture, and Urban Policy under French Colonialism


Intertwined colonial politics, economics, archeology, and personal motives materialize architecturally in Qasr el-Azem. The palace was unmade from an Ottoman residence into a French institution,
unmade
from a French Institute by heavy shelling, then made again with Michel Écochard reconstruction, restoration, and
extension
.

Middleman Activity and its Materialization in the Built Environment of ’Aley (with some stories from Bḥamdūn and Ṣawfar)


This piece focuses on middlemen activity underlying land and real-estate dynamics and how they materialize in the built environment of a town in Mount Lebanon. Through qualitative information—recorded stories from the summer of 2021—I illustrate different genres of the simsār, their business activity, and the landmark sales they facilitate.

Min Bʻīd la-Bʻīd (from Far to Far): On Homemaking under Diasporic Conditions in ’Aley and Shūf


In the villages of Mount Lebanon, homes are realized through years of immigrants’ remittances, messages, objects, and visits. This project offers an expanded understanding of the homes and homemaking of diasporic families, through which they manage separation and fragmentation and adapt to personal and regional political change.