New Egyptian Lifestyle Brand Brings Back Retro Bar Carts

Remember that time, long ago, you would be visiting Tante Manal and be served tea and cookies off of a wooden, often wheeled, coffee tables that could also function as a mini-bar? Tante was obviously not in the know about the mix-use potential of that piece of furniture, but the recently-launched Le Marquis, an Egyptian furniture and lifestyle brand bringing back vintage wooden mini-bars is here to remind us of those fun, bygone times with a collection of hand-crafted, custom-made bar carts, and we're (literally) swept off our feet for these cute creations.

Launched by musician and artist Marc Wahba, Le Marquis is a family business in which Marc and his father channel their artistic passion to create these durable, multi-purpose bar carts. However there is one specific purpose they're after, bringing back elegant drinking culture to Cairo.

"I like everything related to art and design. Being into event planning and solutions, I sought to combine both my passions, partying and design, to create authentic vintage pieces that mostly revolve around drinking and having a good time with family and friends. Everything we build have wheels, and we now have a few bar carts and one coffee table designed," Wahba tells CairoScene.

Le Marquis have so far accumulated five different models, which are priced between EGP 9,000 and EGP 15,000. They're available to order online, and it takes up to four weeks to deliver custom-made versions of them. "I was surprised to find how huge of a market there is for our products, but it makes sense since virtually no store in Cairo offers such products anymore," explains Wahba. "Back in the time almost everyone had these items in their homes, it's not an innovation, it's an old item. But we're bringing back a modern, sleek version of it."

While currently focused on home furniture, Le Marquis also offers setup design services to event planners, with their latest project being the gorgeous setup of Cheers Egypt's Pillow Fight party at MO4Network's Unicorn Garden last weekend (pictured below).

"We take our setup very seriously, and we go all out for it," says Wahba. "The aesthetic aspect is very important for both me and my father, who's also into interior designing and has his own lighting business. We like to mix things up, so we provide setup for indoors and outdoors areas, and we like to be playful with whatever theme we're working with. It's just that we love art, and Le Marquis gives us room to express that and play around with it."

Find Le Marquis on Instagram.