Lebanese business shows resilience out of the rubble

Lebanese business shows resilience out of the rubble

It was “inevitable” that Dima and Tania Nawbar were drawn back to jewellery. “Growing up with a jeweller parent, you feel like you’re part of a cult,” says Dima, the elder of the sisters. “Everything you do revolves around jewellery.”

As children, the pair would play after school in the workshop of the Nawbar store that their father, Elie, ran in London’s Bond Street between 1981 and 1997, before the family moved to Lebanon the following year. They felt no pressure to join the family trade but, having tried other professions, found their hearts belonged to jewellery.

In 2011, they launched L’Atelier Nawbar and have since overcome hurdles — including the devastating port explosion that ripped through Beirut in August 2020 — to grow their fine jewellery business into an increasingly global brand.

Jewellery is in Dima and Tania’s blood: their great-great-grandfather founded the family’s jewellery business in Beirut in 1891. But, when the sisters took over from their father, they changed its creative direction by designing and making everything in-house, and pivoting away from its traditional gold and diamonds look. Their aim is “playfulness”, says Tania, and to create “trendy”, colourful pieces that can be layered and stacked by customers to express