Local handcraft keep traditions alive

Moroccan city Tiznit will embrace the third silver festival at the end of August. The silver festival is an annual cultural, artistic, and economic tradition celebrating silver and related uses for their aesthetic value and as a symbol of social and economic distinction. It also reflects a harmonious system where different government sectors, vocational organisations, and local actors participate, driven by vast horizons of giving and interaction, and a desire to present highest quality silver jewellery.
The festival program, organised this year under the title “silver jewellery: identity, creativity and development”, will include exhibitions of silver jewellery, singing and dancing to the beat of well known Moroccan folklore singers, daily shadow theatre, fashion shows for local fashion and jewellery, and cultural seminars highlighting the history of this kind of jewellery. The seminars will also review the anthropological uniqueness of silver jewellery, especially its relation to women’s innovation and the preservation of the Amazigh identity.
Festival organisers plan the event to be a port for creativity in all its artistic and economic manifestations, and provide an opportunity for innovators and craftsmen to show their products, inspired by the local heritage. The event also encourages passing on the skills and abilities of craftsmen to vocational institution students. It also looks to introduce local products and enable them to blend comfortably with the dynamics of local and regional development, which would prepare them to face international competition.
The main goal of the festival is to encourage local handcrafts, especially jewellery making, and contribute to enhancing cultural and touristic activities in Tiznit, considered a pioneer in silver making. Tiznit has become the second Moroccan city marketing silver products locally and internationally, containing more than 150 silver specialised shops, most of them in the old city.
The silver festival in Tiznit is an annual cultural, artistic, and economic tradition celebrating silver and related uses for their aesthetic value and as a symbol of social and economic distinction. It also reflects a harmonious system where different government sectors, vocational organisations, and local actors participate, driven by vast horizons of giving and interaction, and a desire to present highest quality silver jewellery.