A sneak peek into the new V.Barkowski workshop

An extension of the V.Barkowski Store in Marrakesh, the workshop is set in the same street as the previous store, close to Dar Bacha and Mustapha Blaoui. The area allows Valerie to move seamlessly across the store and the workshop where the craftsmen and colleagues spend most of their working day. "I walk and stroll around the medina, have tea with the craftsmen. This way, I am close to my colleagues, we can more easily share the work but also a meal," says Valerie.

"Things don't always happen as we imagine them. This place was supposed to be an extension of the V.Barkowski Store in Marrakesh. We started work in 2019 and then Covid came along. No more work, no more movement, a shop closed for over a year," she shares.

In Marrakesh Valerie divided her life between the house under the tree, Riad Dar Kawa, the V.Barkowski store and her workshop which was outside the city. She reconfigured her situation and was tired of the endless commute.

Because of the events, the store extension was abandoned. "By force of circumstance, my life has been simplified!" she says. Now she has the shop and the workshop in the same place. "For this space, I imagined a fun, textural play. I still like black and white. The light is beautiful, a new dynamic animates us," she says of her new workshop space.

"During this work I walked around and took photos. I find them strong and graphic. They could almost be a project in their own right," says Valerie.