Category: 50s to 90s

Ghazi Hamad Sultan Bin Isa (1941-2007) was a Kuwaiti architect and urban planner who is regarded as one of the key figures in the modernization of Kuwait. He is best known for the waterfront project (including Green Island) which was developed jointly with Sasaki while working for the Ministry of Public Works. Ghazi Sultan is also renowned for his significant contributions to the Arab art movement. In 1969, he founded Sultan Gallery (@sultangallery) with his sister Najat Sultan, and it remains active to this day.

Ghazi’s son, Zahed Sultan (@zahedsultan), recently launched a website and Instagram page (@ghazihamadsultan) to honor his father’s legacy. According to Zahed, both platforms will be updated regularly, as his father’s archive holds a wealth of material to share.

One section of Ghazi Sultan’s website contains photos of Kuwait taken by him in the 1960s. I’ve decided to share these for now and will hopefully post more stuff from his archive in the future, espcially the architectural projects.

If you want to find out more about Ghazi Sultan, or view the photos he took, head over to ghazisultan.com

I originally posted about Haydo back in 2006. But, this is the story again with some details corrected. I no longer know what the original source of my information was, but there were some timeline inaccuracies and some exaggerated details. So this is as accurate as the story can be with the information I found.

Back in October 1981, Kuwait played a World Cup qualifying match in New Zealand. Just before kickoff, some Kiwi fans displayed an offensive banner reading “Stick to ya camels” as the Kuwaiti team came onto the field. Kuwait went on to win that match, 2–1.

A couple of months later, the two teams met again, this time in Kuwait. The Kuwaiti Football Association adopted a camel named Haydo as its mascot, and just before the game started, they brought out a few camels to parade around the stadium—demonstrating Kuwait’s pride in its heritage. Kuwait drew the match and secured qualification for the 1982 World Cup in Spain.

Kuwait was the first Arab country from Asia to qualify for the tournament. A Spanish newspaper later claimed the Kuwaiti national team would be late to the World Cup because they would be “traveling on the backs of their camels!” Contrary to that prediction, Kuwait arrived early—so early that neither journalists nor locals knew they were even in Spain.

In an effort to gain attention, the head of the Kuwaiti Football Association told a French journalist (who was there to cover the arrival of the French team) that “the Kuwaiti team would withdraw from the competition unless they could bring their mascot, Haydo.” Within hours, the hotel was packed with reporters keen to find out more about the camel mascot.

Eventually, the Spanish authorities and the hotel manager agreed, allowing the Kuwaiti team to bring their camel as long as it stayed in the hotel’s backyard. The head of the Kuwaiti Football Association then called the Moroccan Minister of Sport, requesting that a camel be sent to Spain as soon as possible. He also ordered a custom T-shirt for it.

All the buzz surrounding the camel drew a lot of attention from locals and journalists, making Kuwait’s presence truly felt. From that point on, Haydo became the official mascot of the Kuwaiti national team.

Last week I found a copy of the second Wizr book on a website in Czech Republic for like 2KD and bought it. It’s my second copy, and although I didn’t have plans for it originally, someone gave me the idea of scanning and digitizing the books so I might end up sacrificing this extra copy by taking it apart and scanning the pages.

I first posted about the Wizr 10 years ago. Wizr was a series of stories written by Keith Wells, a British journalist who was living in Kuwait back in the 70s. Keith used to work for Arab Times, and between 1979 and 1984, released three Wizr books with the help of Peter McMahon, an illustrator. To me the stories feel like funny blog posts inspired by his experiences in Kuwait, from dealing with ministry paperwork, to poking fun at the driving here. I was communicating with Keith this past week, getting some more info for this post, and he’s still a pretty funny guy. He left Kuwait in 1987 and is now retired living with his wife Suzi in Australia.

Keith originally met Peter at a party. Peter hadn’t read any of the Wizr stories so when Keith told him who Wizr was, Peter picked up a sheet of paper, scribbled away for a minute or two, then held it out and asked Keith, “Him?” It was perfect. After that, both became close friends.

Keith would write a story, take it to Peter’s flat every Friday, and he’d illustrate the cartoon. The combination became very popular and after a couple of months in the Arab Times, they were approached by Tony Jashanmal, who owned a department store on Fahed Salem St, and Bashir Khatib, who owned the ‘The Kuwait Bookshops’ to publish a book full of the stories. The first book one was launched at the British Embassy Gardens in November 1979. They sold 428 copies that night, and Keith and Peter left home with a bag full of cash.

The two carried on working together for around a year, then Peter was murdered, a long sad story (which I’m hoping to get more information on soon). The second Wizr book was published with cartoons that weren’t used for the first, and the third book used odd scraps and recycled pics. The books are pretty hard to come by so I was curious to how many copies were printed. According to Keith, in total, they printed 10,000 copies of the first two books, and around 5,000 of the third. There were only around 4,000 or so native English speakers in Kuwait back then, but according to Keith most people bought multiple copies of the books and sent them to relatives and friends abroad.

Keith still has around 50 copies of the books left, as well as Peter’s original cartoons, and several of his oil paintings. He’s digging through his stuff to see what else he might still have. We’re both trying to figure out what to do with all of it, maybe ship everything to Kuwait and hold an exhibition. I suggested maybe putting him in touch with the British Embassy and maybe have them bring him over and have some sort of event again in the British Embassy Gardens, like a 45 year anniversary thing. If you have ideas, let me know!

The books aren’t easy to come by, but they do pop up online every now and then. I scanned a few pages and illustrations from the book and uploaded them to Flickr. I’ve included the unedited scans, as well as scans I’ve edited where I’ve combined the stories and illustrations to fit on one page. You can check them out here.

Back in 2017 I posted about how “Old Kuwait is Digitally Disappearing“. The article was mostly about how things are disappearing off the internet, it could be old articles, photos or videos related to Kuwait. Now I’ve realized we have another problem, people who were involved with Kuwait back in the 60s and 70s are starting to die.

There was a photographer I was in touch with last year called Tor Eigeland. He had visited Kuwait back in 1967 according to him although I think it was sometime in the 70s based off the photograph I had found of his of the Kuwait Towers under construction (the photo in this post). Yesterday I messaged him because I had some things I wanted to run by him and his wife replied to me letting me know he sadly passed away this past April at the age of 92.

There is a guy who reached out to me who was part of the team that brought the Marriott Hotel ship to Kuwait. I haven’t been able to get a hold of him for nearly a year now so I fear he’s passed away as well.

Yesterday I got in touch with Keith Wells, a British journalist who was living in Kuwait back in the 70s. I was worried he had passed away since the last time I spoke to him was 10 years ago, thankfully he turned out to be still alive.

But thats basically how things are at the moment, every time I email someone I used to be in touch with, I wonder if they’re still alive. I feel like there are still too many stories that need to be documented, and many will sadly never be told.

Since we are on the subject of Kuwait Airways, while browsing the New York Times archive I found an article from Feb. 11, 1974 which talks about the Kuwaiti parliament debating if Kuwait Airways should continue to serve alcohol on its flight:

---

Serving of Drinks on Airline at Issue in Kuwait

KUWAIT, Feb. 9—The National Assembly, Kuwait’s lively parliament, was in an uproar this week over whether Kuwait’s national airline should, continue to serve alcoholic drinks on its flights.

The Moslem religion prohibits consumption of intoxicating beverages, and this is a major issue between “liberal” and “fundamentalist” Arabs around the Persian Gulf.

It is an issue of some terest to Western oilmen and business representatives who are in the area in growing numbers, as well as for many Arabs who have studied or done business abroad, where they acquired a Western taste for a highball or cocktails.

Uproar in Assembly

One of these Arabs is Abdulaziz al‐Massaeed, the publisher of Dar Al Rai al‐Amm, one of Kuwaits leading morning newspapers.

Mr. Massaeed, an elected deputy in the 50‐member National Assembly, set off the uproar during a debate on the budget for the national airline when he replied to conservative members who said Kuwait’s “dry” law should apply to the state company’s international flights.

“I, as a free citizen, would refrain from traveling aboard any plane that does not sell liquor,” said Mr. Massaeed, who travels frequently to Europe on business and for holidays. He added:

“I take liquor. Ninety per cent of Kuwaitis drink and know many of the deputies drink also.”

This touched off a furor, With conservative members banging their desks and shouting for the floor.

Moslem Prohibition Brings Furor in Parliament and Blood‐Test Challenge

“I challenge the members to take a blood test to see who drinks and who doesn’t,” retorted Mr. Massaeed over the uproar.

$30 for Scotch

While Kuwait is officially dry, and no alcoholic drinks are served even in the big international hotels, there is a large black market in foreign liquors. For instance, a bottle of Scotch will be delivered to a guest’s room in one of the major hotels for $30.

In private homes, many Kuwaitis serve liquor to their Western guests, and hard drinking among Kuwaitis and other Arabs here who can afford it is not unusual.

But any public place, or even Private club, is subject to prohibition. When the Kuwait National Bank had a reception this week for visiting Western bankers at a hotel, it was for tea, not cocktails.

In other places along the gulf, the situation varies from the strict fundamentalism of Saudi Arabia, where travelers bringing liquor in their luggage can be arrested, to the relativey free‐wheeling habits of Bahrain or Dubai, where there are bars.

Drink or Pray

Supporting his argument for tolerance of drinkers aboard the Kuwait airline, Mr. Massaeed said that the ruler of Dubai, Shiek Rashid bin Said al‐Maktum, had told a protesting delegation of religious leaders that this was a matter for individual choice.

According to Mr. Massaeed, Sheik Rashid said: “Here there is a mosque and over there is a bar. Whoever wants to please himself can resort to either prayer or drink.” Sheik Rashid is noted for his business acumen, the newspaper official said.

In the end the budget of the Kuwait airline, which flies as far as London and New Delhi, as well as around the Middle East, was approved on the condition that Finance Minister Abdel‐Rahman Salem al‐Atigi make a “thorough study” of the effect that banning liquor sales might have on the willingness of non‐Moslem passengers to use the airline.

Found this article while browsing through the NYT archive. I hadn’t heard of this incident before. Article taken from the New York Times Sept. 18, 1977 issue.

KUWAIT, Sept. 17 (AP)—Seven monkeys escaped from their cage in the Kuwait zoo and killed two children in panicked crowd, ‘ the police reported today. A zookeeper was seriously bitten in the incident Friday before policemen shot and killed one of the monkeys and captured the others in a long chase, the police said.

The ice skating rink used to be one of my favorite landmarks in Kuwait. As a kid in the 80s, I took ice skating lessons there, and by the early 90s, it became a popular hangout spot for me as a teenager. We’d listen to great music (there was a DJ), play arcade games, grab dinner, and, of course, skate. I always loved the building’s design—it was truly iconic. When I created the Kuwait Blogs app back in 2010, I chose the ice skating rink as the image to represent Kuwait. It felt less cliché than the Kuwait Towers, and its unique shape made for a perfect app icon.

The rink was designed by French architect Dominique Beau, whose firm won the contract in November 1977. It officially opened in March 1980, making it the first ice skating complex of its kind in the Middle East. Beau thoughtfully incorporated local culture into the design—the iconic structure was inspired by Bedouin tents, while the terracotta tiles on the interior and exterior walls were influenced by traditional Sadu weavings.

Sadly, the rink was demolished in 2020 to make way for a new ice skating rink as part of the Al Shaheed Park Phase III project. When I got a sneak peek of the new rink last year, I noticed a tribute area dedicated to the old one. It’s a mini museum showcasing parts from the original rink, including terracotta tile wall patterns, ceiling beams, original seats, and other artifacts. Interestingly, the minaret of the Phase III mosque was built using beams from the old rink. Still, I wish they had preserved the original rink instead of replacing it.

I’m usually pretty good at digging things up, but I’ve never managed to find photos of the rink during its construction. Thankfully, Laila Al Hamed from @zericrafts and Huda Abdulmughni from @studio.khemiae spent over a year working to get their hands on some very rare photos. These came from the French architect, Dominique, and an engineer who worked with the Al Kharafi Group during its construction. I’ve shared some of the photos before but I’ve now uploaded them to my Flickr account in their original size and unedited. You can check them here.

A few weeks ago I spotted a post by Gulf Bank on LinkedIn celebrating their 64 year anniversary. They had shared a few old photos but they were low-res and not really that great, so I decided I’d try and find some better ones, and I did.

According to Gulf Bank’s ‘About Us‘ page, the bank was founded in 1960. The page also mentions that in 1961, they hired architect Jean-Robert Delb to design their head office. While the building he designed is still their head office today, they only moved into it in September 1976, according to an old newspaper ad. Before that, they operated from a different head office.

Their original head office was designed in 1963 by Tony Irving and Gordon Jones of the Design Construction Group (DCG). The building was two floors and was composed of three separate buildings wrapped into one. The municipality for some reason had insisted that the owners of the units adjoining the bank adopt the identical architectural treatment, which is how we ended up with that iconic looking block.

Sadly, the original Gulf Bank head office building was recently demolished. It was the same building that had housed Richard’s Coffee and NIU, right across the street from Souk Mubarakia.

The photos above are from a 1972 issue of Aramco World and were taken by Burnett H. Moody. The black and white photo below was taken by Andy Warhol when he visited Kuwait.

The advert below was taken from Kuwait Times, September 1976 issue.

From all the issues in Kuwait, this is one they felt needed fixing? This was a pretty iconic mural, yes it was old, and the paint had faded, but that’s because it was painted over three decades ago. The mural had a purpose, and it meant something. Now it’s just a painting of a flag on a side of an old building.

Found these two photos in an Aramco Magazine from 1969 with the following caption:

The young, tiny state of Kuwait has an ambitious program of special education for the handicapped. The Blind may complete a program of arithmatic and reading and writing in braille with training in leather work or manufacturing wicker furniture.

Made me wonder if we have a similar program today.

Photos by Khalil Abou El Nasr

I came across a diary from a woman named Thérèse, who was married to a French engineer working on the construction of the Boubyan Bridge. The bridge was built by the French engineering firm Bouygues—the same team behind major projects like the Channel Tunnel and Terminal 2 at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport.

According to Thérèse, the French employees lived in a small camp near the bridge construction site, with the Chinese workers in a separate camp nearby. They arrived in Kuwait in 1981 and left in 1982. Each family had its own bungalow, and the camp also included some entertainment facilities like a clubhouse with a swimming pool, game hall, and restaurant.

It was interesting going through all her photos and random stories, since it gave a glimpse into the life of this isolated community in Kuwait.

Even though they lived on the camp, the children still attended the French School in Salmiya. The commute was an hour each way, and at first they used to be transported by bus but later the company got them a more comfortable Suburban. Once a week the mums would be allowed to accompany the children on the ride so they could go shopping or to the hairdresser. Once the kids are done with school, they used to go have lunch at the Le Meridien Hotel, but as customers complained about the commotion the kids would make, the hotel started refusing to serve them.

One Christmas they had Santa Claus come down on the roof of the clubhouse using a construction crane that was on site. The crane driver tried to be funny and dropped Santa Clause partially into the swimming pool which caused Santa to let off a string of expletives in front of the kids. The following year Santa refused to arrive by air and instead opted to arrive on a donkey.

I loved reading these random, mundane tidbits

According to Thérèse, social life was fairly calm, but they had a community and they held parties often, and also shared books and videotapes. They seemed to have made the best of their time in Kuwait, with the only complaint being about the violent sandstorms.

There are too many photos to share here so if you want to check them out, here is the link to the page on her time in Kuwait.

The page is in French, so use Google Translate if you want to read it in English.

I’m still trying to find anything I can about the Hunt Room, a restaurant that used to be located in the Sheraton Hotel before the 1990 Gulf War. Not sure why I’m so obsessed with it, I never ate there.

My family used to have lunch every Friday at the Al Hambra which was located on the other side of the hotel on the same floor. Once we were done with lunch I’d wander around the hotel as a kid would do, but I mostly spent my time at the telex counter reading the latest news headlines and that was located near the Hunt Room. So I’d always take a peek inside and I remember they had a huge lobster aquarium outside. But thats as far as my interaction with the place was which is why its confusion for me why I’m fascinated by it. Maybe because I never experienced it?

Not sure but whatever the reason, I’m constantly looking for anything I can find about the restaurant, Sheraton themselves don’t seem to have anything either. But I recently found this cute little plate on eBay. It’s such a great find because it has the Hunt Room Logo and the colors which I now remember clearly.

If you have anything related to the Hunt Room, memories, photos, whatever, just let me know in the comments.

One of my favorite things about my blog is putting random information out onto the web, only to have someone months or years later leave a comment saying they were involved in the project or have more information about it. It constantly happens and it’s always pretty rewarding.

Back in March 2023 I posted about the Mothercare tree, the huge animatronic tree that used to be located at the Mothercare store in Salmiya. I didn’t think a lot of people remembered it, so I was pretty surprised with the amount of engagement that post got.

19 months after my post, a person by the name of Roger left a comment saying he had worked on the project and had more photos. Roger came to Kuwait in 1998 to install the tree along with his team. His company supplied and programmed the tree and all the animated animals and their soundtracks. He had photos of the tree being built as well as ones from inside the tree. Roger had gotten the job because he had previously been involved animatronics when he worked for Madame Tussauds and Rock Circus.

The pictures were taken with his first digital camera and so aren’t that high resolution, but it’s definitely better than nothing. I’ve uploaded all the photos to Flickr and you can check them out here.

Thanks Roger for sharing!

Years ago I found photos of Kuwait from 1980. I didn’t share all of them back then, but I just found the folder on my computer this morning and picked a bunch taken by The Architects Collaborative while they were in Kuwait back then.

When we look at old photos of Kuwait, we often see only beautiful shots which gives the inaccurate impression that everything was perfect back then. Which is why I like these unpolished photos of Kuwait which shows the beautiful old buildings starting to fall apart.

It feels like the architects captured a period when Kuwait was transitioning from old to new once again. Check them all out in hi-res here.

Muneera is an independent cultural researcher and documentary photographer who for the past 4 years has been going around Kuwait documenting post-oil houses. Her account is filled with beautiful but decaying homes, that even in their current state still look better than a lot of the newer generic buildings that have been popping up over the past few decades.

When Muneera first started documenting these houses she didn’t have any preconceived ideas of them. Their odd structure compared to buildings around them stood out to her, and their futuristic design contrasted with their deteriorating condition raised a lot of questions about the past and present:

• What happened back then?
• Why do we decide to build our homes the way we do?
• What contributes to shaping our homes, neighborhoods, streets, and cities?
• What impact does that have on our environment and lived experience in those spaces?

She’s documenting and researching these houses as a way to answer some of these questions, and understand the value of these buildings while considering the wider issues related to land use in Kuwait.

I’m always fascinated with Kuwait’s past and its stories, so I really appreciate Muneera’s effort in capturing these beautiful homes before they disappear forever.

Muneera was also initially documenting baqalas so she could look into their disappearance and the culture around it. She had to stop though since it was taking too much time and decided to focus on the house for now. I actually didn’t really notice baqalas disappearing until she brought it up. My two favorite baqalas in my neighborhood closed down years ago, one turned into a bubble tea shop, the other into a Filipino bakery. They really might be disappearing.

Check out Muneera’s account @th9neighborhood for more photos—she’s captured many beautiful buildings.