Pile Knot Rug

Fatima Haddash

When Fatima Haddash was young, her family picked up from the southern village of Tinghir and moved to Oued Ifrane. Despite her distant roots, everyone in her village now affectionately knows her as ‘mama.’ Fatima knows how to make all the types of carpets that Association Nahda creates. With every carpet she sells, she hopes to use the money to invest it in the future of her eight children and many more grandchildren.

Hanan Sadaoui

Born in 1980 in Kasr Moui, in the region of Errachidia (28km away from Goulmima). Hanan Sadaoui moved from her hometown to Khemisset with her family and learned how to weave from her mother. When she got married, Hanan moved with her husband to his village (Oued Ifrane) where she joined the association he founded for the local weavers. Hanan is the proud mother of two, a boy and a girl and she hopes to develop her weaving skills and help her husband in developing opportunities for their local communities.

Rabha Houari

Rabha Houari was born in 1979 in Oued Ifrane and has managed to go to school until the sixth grade of primary school. She joined the association after her divorce in order to support herself and also to develop her skills together with the women at the association. She really wishes for her work to be recognised in the neighbouring souks for their quality.

Fatima Mahboub

Fatima Mahboub was born in 1970 in the outskirts of Oued Ifrane. She didn’t go to school. She married and had two sons and two daughters. She learned weaving from her mother and is among the women who have perfected the art of the Zamora and Zayane carpets. She really wishes to share her skills with other women in the association and teach them her specific techniques.

Meriam Amskini

Meriam is married and is the mother of one daughter. She was born in Ait Aziz and learned weaving from her mother as a younger girl. Meriam has never had the opportunity to attend school, and has been selling carpets in the weekly marketplace for many years. Every time she sells a carpet at the market place, she has to sell it at an incredibly low price, one equal to 5 dirhams or 50 cents a day in order to compete with other carpet sellers. Because of these low prices, she stopped weaving, feeling frustrated. She is a fantastic weaver in the traditional red carpets with black and white motifs, and now she has started weaving again as a member of the coop, hoping to increase her living standards through fair pay.