It was 2020 and I was leafing through my go-to e-commerce stores, marketplaces and galleries to find pieces to adorn my living room walls. I'd been obsessively at this for days, and was having a hard time. My favourite stores recommended me options - many even aesthetically gorgeous - but none that I particularly connected with. I wanted my sanctuary to reflect my story and values. I wanted to be surrounded by pieces that

1) Evoked the emotion and sentiment of places I'd made memories in

2) Shared the splendor and story of the makers' heritage, and

3) Were not only world class in their design and quality, but gave me the comfort of knowing they were also ethically made and choosing them made our world incrementally better.

In the past, I was able to find these pieces if I did a lot of research and went on sourcing trips to the countries themselves (read: a multiple-day trip into the heart of the Atlas mountains to find a specific, famed Berber designer that created rugs with a distinct colour palette. Credit to ever-patient travel friends). However, these creations and talent are, unfortunately, largely under-discovered and not easy to access globally.

We started QISA to change this.

QISA means stories in Arabic - an ode to Morocco where I first heard that spoken word. An ode to where I first learned that every symbol, every shade, and every line stroke of a piece I admired was deliberate and steeped in generational rights and history.

At QISA, our goal is to make it easy to furnish our sanctuaries with aesthetically gorgeous, yet meaningful and consciously-made pieces. We aim to be your ultimate design mecca by co-developing and painstakingly curating hard-to-find, designer artisan pieces for your home.

Ultimately - if you want to hear about ultimately - we aim to go beyond that to inspire and create a community of ethically conscious and diversely empowered individuals committed to changing the way we envision, represent, and consume luxury.

Come, join us on this journey.