The Founder of Third Space Lives Inside a Zamalek Art Gallery

Ahmed El Kady lives in an apartment that looks much like Third Space Zamalek, the interior design studio he opened around the corner a few years ago. But the founder and creative director’s home came together after decades of collection. In a 1936 building, El Kady layers his walls with contemporary Egyptian art and covers his floors with art deco and mid-century modern furniture. He designed a home to entertain, where guests flow between the foyer, living, and dining room with ease.

“I love entertaining,” El Kady tells SceneHome. “I hate going out.” According to El Kady, the best nights are those spent with close friends, good drinks, and delicious food in a beautiful home.

The procession begins at the bar—in a room that is always dim, even at midday. “The lighting in this apartment is very soft, which allows you to relax,” El Kady explains.

He loves how light can transform the mood in a room and the emotion in a painting. He chose one by Egyptian artist Ahmed El Badawy to cover the wall behind the bar, a man who “plays with light like no other,” El Kady says. He calls him the “Caravaggio of Egyptian art.”

Behind the bar is where El Kady greets his guests with a drink. From there they drift into the living room, passing to the right of a statue by sculptor Ahmed Askalany. El Kady found the piece at an antique shop in Alexandria, along with a number of light fixtures and decorative trinkets. “It used to be the heart of the antique market,” he laments. El Kady can’t find the treasures he once did in the coastal city.

The light coming through the window in the living room clarifies the colours of each painting. There is little room between each frame, distinct styles tied together by the room’s earth-toned palette.

“You can tell I’m crazy about Egyptian art,” El Kady says. He collects from young, up and coming Egyptian artists, many who have risen to prominence since he bought their paintings. One of the largest and most modern pieces in the living room is by Egyptian artist Kairo Lumumba—a black and white abstract painting that hangs squarely above the couch.

“I love a bit of contemporary Egyptian art, a bit of Islamic art, a bit of Coptic art—a mix,” he adds, walking between the couch and coffee table.

El Kady designed the long coffee table himself to fit the narrow space and covered it with books. “This one is my favourite.” He picks up Liliane Karnouk’s 'Modern Egyptian Art, 1910-2003' and scans the cover. “Egyptian art is truly unmatched,” El Kady says.

After catching up in the living room over a drink, the conversation carries over into the dining room, where a feast awaits. “I cook, and I cook well,” El Kady grins. And the food presentation must match the apartment. “You have to dress the table to the nines,” he says.

The table is surrounded by more canvases of varying sizes. The most striking is a triptych by artist Alaa Aboelhamd. “This is the perfect mix between pharaonic and art deco,” El Kady says about the three female figures standing side by side.

El Kady’s walls reveal a decades-long evolution of his artistic taste. He layers old eras atop the new.

“Layering is very important,” he says, making his way back into the front room, completing his loop. “It doesn’t happen overnight, it doesn’t happen over a year, it happens over your lifetime as your idea of beauty changes.”