Yasmine Nachabe Taan interviews Beirut-based, French-Lebanese illustrator Aude Abou Nasr. They discuss Aude's educational and professional journey from starting in architecture into illustration and activism. Aude discusses her interest in narratives that address issues of belonging and the strife of migrants (women in particular). She also discusses her passion for projects that address justice and social issues, and her commissions and collaborations with various artists and organizations. Together they unpack her creative process, her creative commitments, and the challenges of making a living as an illustrator. Aude speaks about her collaboration with the architectural collectives representing Lebanon in the Venice Architectural Biennale, weaving stories of nature and politics. She expresses her concerns about not having enough time to execute her work properly, to reflect and explore at a slower pace. She concludes with stressing on the importance of collaboration and collective support within the creative community.

Roshanak Keyghobadi interviews Iranian California-based graphic designer and illustrator Ghazal Foroutan. They discuss Ghazal's journey as a designer, her educational stages, and her impactful first professional experience at Studio Shizaru in Tehran. Ghazal discusses her interest in design research and design history that developed during her postgraduate studies in the US. She mentions that her design history education (both in Iran and the U.S.) was male-centric, and expresses her gratitude to contemporary platforms, such as Khatt Chronicles and Women Iranian Designers, for broadening her knowledge and providing information about women role models. As a woman growing up in Iran, she experienced challenges that made her want to work on projects that advocated for (Iranian) women's rights and equality. She discusses her cultural engagement and political activism through her personal design projects. Ghazal discusses her design process and her passion for the risography technique and how she employs it for her "passion projects"—personal prints, editorial work, and publications. She shares her challenges of balancing teaching, personal project, and paid design commissions. The conversation ends with a discussion about the future of design: AI and responsible innovation, and adaptability to the complex media and communications landscape. Ghazal believes that we need to see design not just as a service but rather as a way to shape culture and create a culture of solidarity. Ghazal Foroutan is one the designers featured in the book, Revealing Recording Reflecting: Graphic Women from Southwest Asia and North Africa (Amsterdam: Khatt Books, 2024).

Yara Khoury Nammour interviews Cairo-based Lebanese designer and visual artist Bahia Shehab. They discuss Shehab's motivation and journey as a designer and educator. Shehab delves into political engagement, the importance of portraying an authentic image of Arab/Islamic visual heritage in order to decolonize design history discourse. They discuss her influences and how her educational development has shaped her perspective on design. Shehab elaborates on her artistic practice, her academic research, and her publications: A Thousand Times No, Art the Corner of a Dream, You Can Crush the Flowers, History of Arab Graphic Design, Revealing Recording Reflecting, and an upcoming publication on vernacular culture and advertising. They discuss the challenges for knowledge creation and dissemination in the Arab world: starting with the obstacles that hinder collection, documentation, and preservation of material. They conclude the conversation with the idea that change comes in a collective effort of certain generation and time period, and that maybe this is the moment to establish an Arab graphic design museum in the region.

Yasmine Nachabe Taan interviews Beirut-based Syrian visual storyteller and illustrator Dima Nachawi. They discuss her professional journey, education, and projects. Dima shares her passion for making people laugh, clowning, drawing, singing, performing, shadow puppetry, and street theater. Her multidisciplinary practice is connected to her Syrian roots through which she documents and advocates for social causes and injustices. Together they unpack some of the political narratives behind her projects, and discuss how humor can help circumvent censorship and oppression. They also discuss the importance of female figures with long flowing hair in her illustrations; how they symbolize homelands, freedom, strength, and resilience; and how they are often a part of the cityscape or of trees, rooted in nature, and holding their ground. Dima Nachawi's work is featured in the book, Revealing Recording Reflecting: Graphic Women from Southwest Asia and North Africa (Amsterdam: Khatt Books, 2024).

Huda Smitshuijzen AbiFarès interviews Brussels-based, Syrian-Polish designer Kinda Ghannoum. They discuss her journey into the field of design, through practical work following her graduation with a degree in architecture from the University of Damascus. Kinda shares her travails as a self-taught graphic designer and her passion for the Arabic script, lettering and typography. The conversation centers around issues of preservation of identity while saddling two nationalities, and of providing educational resources to design students in Syria and preserving Syrian design history, as well as what it means to be practicing in a diasporic context. A number of Kinda's remarkable projects are discussed starting with her seminal archival project, The Syrian Design Archive, that she set up with two friends – Sally Alassafen and Hala Al Afsaa – in 2020 during her postgraduate studies in Belgium. Kinda also discusses some of her other significant projects where cultural advocacy and collaboration was at the core. What transpires from this conversation is an image of a courageous and dedicated woman designer that breaks any stereotypes of women from the Southwest Asia and North Africa (SWANA) region. Kinda's work is featured in the book "Revealing Recording Reflecting: Graphic Women from Southwest Asia and North Africa" (Amsterdam: Khatt Books, 2024).

Roshanak Keyghobadi interviews New York-based Iranian designer Zeynab Izadyar. They discuss her journey into the field of design and textile design; beginning with her education as graphic designer in Tehran, followed by her postgraduate studies at Yale University School of Art, then backtracking to her childhood. Zeynab candidly shares stories about her creative father and her collaboration with him on "making" things, from books and furniture for her dolls, to knitting, and drawing. The moment of a chance discovery of her mother's well-saved Iranian linen rice bags filled her with a sense of wonder and a recognition of their cultural value to her. This eventually led to the establishing her design studio, vvork vvork vvork (https://vvorkvvorkvvork.com) which specialises in clothing and textile design. The conversation then smoothly moves to gender issues in relation to her work as a textile designer. She shares her struggles in overcoming her initial rejection of — and later her pride in — the "feminine" label assigned to textile design and garment-making. The discussion then turns to the gender-biased perception of graphic design in Iran, where female designers are challenged to fight for recognition. Zeynab ends with this closing remark: "I learned to get rid of the idea of being perfect and right, […] leaving room for mistakes that provide [me with] a space to grow.”

Yara Khoury Nammour interviews London-based Lebanese designer Samar Maakaroun. They discuss at length her journey into the field of branding and lettering, her work at Pentagram studio in London and what it means to be the first Lebanese partner in the studio. They cover her independent project on lettering "29 Words for 29 Letters" – playing with meanings, writing systems, and animation, to build a playful and experimental multicultural glossary, and embracing the multiplicity and complexity that comes from thinking in and working with two languages, and in a diasporic context. Samar discusses a special book project for the charity SkatePal and how the timing of the project lent it a different and more poignant political urgency. The discussion ends with a conversation about AI and how it can be supportive of designers' work, but also how it can be misused.

Huda Smitshuijzen AbiFarès moderates a conversation between the hosts of season 4 of @khatt_chronicles. The discussion addressed the three main themes that are planned for this season, focusing on the overarching theme of Graphic Women from the SWANA region. The Khatt Foundation's latest research project that culminated in the publication "Revealing Recording Reflecting, Graphic Women from Southwest Asia and North Africa" published by Khatt Books at the end of 2024 will be used to guide the themes and selection of guests. The book is divided around the themes of "By Women About Women," "Engaged Image-Making," "Women of Letters," and "Women Designers in the Diaspora." The hosts Huda Smitshuijzen AbiFarès, Yasmine Nachabe Taan, Yara Khoury Nammour, and Roshanak Keyghobadi, introduce the potential designers they will each be speaking to and themes they will be discussing this season, extending a little further into the next season and more specifically some of the 90 women designers and visual artists featured.

In this episode of Khatt Chronicles, Roshanak Keyghobadi interviews UK-based Iranian type designer and researcher Sahar Afshar. They discuss Sahar's journey into the field of type design, the challenges she faced along the way, and her views on the responsibility of designing a typeface. They discuss some of Sahar's main and award-winning type projects. They touch upon specific topics of technology and how it might facilitate certain tedious tasks and speed up the design process. They also unpack the issue of the exclusion of women from the Iranian Graphic design history and the broader issue of the representation of women in the type design field at large. They end the conversation on a positive note highlighting the active role that the younger generation are taking in publishing and uncovering the professional engagement of women in graphic design.

In this episode of Khatt Chronicles, Huda Smitshuijzen AbiFarès interviews France-based Algerian graphic and designer Walid Bouchouchi. They discuss his journey into the field of graphic design, his move to France (first Paris, then Marseille), and his professional transformation along the way. Walid discusses the design education and practice in Algeria in caparison with Paris and Marseille. They unpack his ideas on designing, researching, type design, publication design, and other range of graphic design practices. They zoom in on his design process and the motivations behind his inventive typeface design and its relation to spoken language and Algerian Amazigh identity. They also discuss some of his main projects that carry personal meaning, focusing on immigration and feeling at home.

In this episode of Khatt Chronicles, Yara Khoury Nammour interviews France-based Iranian educator and independent type designer Sina Fakour. They discuss his design teaching and the paths one can take as a graphic designer. They unpack his ideas on designing thinking, research, creative coding, type design, publication design, and a range of other graphic design practices. They zoom in on his type design process, how he develops his concepts, his interest in multiscript typeface design, and how he introduces this to design students in France. They discuss his postgraduate research work on the Linear Elamite script at the Atelier National de Recherches Typographique (ANRT) in Nancy, France. Finally, we learn about his personal ambitions and publishing desires and the struggles of balancing all aspects of working as an independent designer.

In this episode of Khatt Chronicles, Roshanak Keyghobadi interviews Iranian designer Mitra Shahsavand, design director and founder of the Mitra Shahsavand Design Studio. They discuss Mitra's journey into the field of graphic design and focus on some of her impactful and challenging projects of presenting women products within the Iranian public space. They also discuss education, the role of women in the Iranian graphic design scene, and the attitudes of the new generation of designers. They end with some thoughts on what will be important for designers in the future within the technology-dominated field of graphic design.

In this episode of Khatt Chronicles, Huda Smitshuijzen AbiFarès interviews Iranian designer Aria Kasaei, who co-founded Studio Kargah with his classmate and friend Peyman Pourhossein. They discuss his journey into the field of graphic design and the cultural engagement from Studio Kargah's humble beginnings in a basement in Tehran to its present day status, and the recent setting up of a satellite studio in Paris. Together, they discuss the archiving, exhibiting and publishing on design history in Iran and the region, and reiterate the importance of collaboration on such projects between designers and institutions in the region. They address the important role that women designers and younger generations are playing in Studio Kargah as well the design scene in the region, and finally highlight some of Studio Kargah's projects and collaborations with various type designers and cultural activists in Iran and the diaspora.

In this episode of Khatt Chronicles, Yasmine Nachabe Taan interviews Lebanese design writer and critic, Sahar Khraibani. They discuss her journey into the field of design writing through graphic design and illustration. Together, they unpack the importance of design and critical writing at this moment in time. They discuss Sahar's major writing projects, the importance of exposing local narratives, and how to present these untold stories to a wide range of audiences. They end their discussion talking about design education in the region and the United States, how to decolonize the design cannon, and how to disseminate information in a democratic and inclusive way.

In this episode of Khatt Chronicles, Huda Smitshuijzen AbiFarès interviews Iranian type designer and researcher Amir Mahdi Moslehi. They discuss his journey into calligraphy and type design. Moslehi discusses his extensive research into #Persian calligraphic and #script heritage, namely Nastaaliq and Manuscript Pahlevi. The discussion touches upon technologies and script-specific #design issues, and dives deeply into a number of Moslehi's award-winning type design projects.

Yara Khoury Nammour interviews Beirut-based Lebanese designer Nisrine Sarkis. They discuss her journey into the world of branding and lettering. Focusing initially on illustration and graphic design, Nisrine gradually realized the importance of Arabic typography to her practice after starting to work professionally as a graphic designer. Nisrine discusses her interest in display Arabic typefaces that she intends to develop out of her lettering projects. They also explore her teaching Arabic typography in Beirut, her design process, and her vision for design in the Arab world.

In this episode of the Khatt Chronicles podcast, Yasmine Nachabe Taan interviews Dubai-based Egyptian illustrator and comics artist Nora Zeid. They discuss her journey into the field of graphic novels and comics through studying visual communication. The conversation addresses the importance of memory, heritage, personal narratives, and visual storytelling. Zooming in on her project "Cairo Illustrated", they discuss the role of illustration in reviving heritage and reconnecting with one's culture. They speak of the importance of capturing the city as it's being transformed and how narrative illustration can be a means to preserve architectural heritage and popular neighborhoods. They discuss her choice of only using black and white in her graphic illustrations to best capture the complex details of Cairo's city scenes. They also discuss her choice to use her grandmother's stories and neighborhood as a starting point for her novel which renders the narrative more intimate, peaceful, and personal. They end the conversation with a discussion about her future projects and possible new graphic novels about other Arab cities.

In this episode of the Khatt Chronicles podcast, Huda Smitshuijzen AbiFarès leads a discussion with the authors of the three latest titles from @khatt_books' Arabic Design Library series. Dr Haytham Nawar introduces "Nagy Shaker: An Experimental Graphic Artist of the Egyptian Avant-Garde"; Dr. Huda Smitshuijzen AbiFares & Dr Nagla Samir introduce "Mouneer Al-Shaarani: Against the Grain, Exploring the Scope of the Arabic Letter"; and Dr. Yasmine Nachabe Taan introduces "Mouna Bassili Sehnaoui: The First Lebanese Woman Graphic Designers to Brand her Nation".

Huda Smitshuijzen AbiFarès interviews Dubai-based Iraqi calligrapher and designer Wissam Shawkat. They discuss his journey into calligraphy and graphic design starting from his teenage years as a student in Iraq to his move to Dubai – where both his calligraphy and graphic design career crystallized. The conversation addresses the importance of innovation in calligraphy and its relation to contemporary graphic design practice.