Katamon – the Houses From Within event in Jerusalem

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The day was a crazy one. There were so many homes I wanted to see in such a short amount of time, and some just didn’t happen. One place in Ein Kerem had a line so long we decided to leave and not wait, the next place closed because too many people showed up and the owners got freaked out, and the third place we simply couldn’t find on time. But there was a huge silver lining, one family opened their house even though they weren’t on the list, one of the homes we saw had me simply gobsmacked, and another home had such lovely owners we just wanted to stay and hang out for the rest of the day – I’m starting with that house. You’ll see the shockingly lovely one later this week. 

Here’s a great solution for all those old teapots…



I love the embroidery in that dress, and I love a dress as art just hanging on a wall. I would probably display it a bit better (maybe a wooden hanger?), but at least it isn’t a wire one (reference to Mommy Dearest for those in the know.)
Sigal and Chanchal Banga met in India (he’s Indian, she’s Israeli). They fell in love, got married, and she dragged his tuchas back to Israel. They have one gorgeous baby daughter and live in Katamon in Jerusalem. Chanchal studied art in university, and has been working on breaking into the Israeli art scene – however, being Israel, doing art alone is not enough (it takes awhile before being an artist can sustain a family in this country and he’s just not there yet).

The ceiling hangings brought such color and life to the room. The turquoise painted wood also helped enliven what would have been a dark room.
In the meantime they have a bunch of side businesses. On Thursdays they do vegetarian Indian Cuisine in their home between 7p and 11:30p. They also do catering and private events. You have to call and reserve a spot:  077 – 337 – 7988 . She also sells ecological diapers and other baby things.

This lamp really struck me. With so much stuff being imported from India, why don’t we see more of these here? This is so much more interesting that the typical paper lamps.

The ceiling had panels across it (you can see the turquoise color much better here). I have to admit that the subject of the art had me confused but I didn’t ask.

This picture isn’t as clear as I would like, but the panel was so neat I wanted to include it anyhow. I really need to get a better camera…

The dining room holds everything and is filled with color. The painted dresser is fabulous. Again, photo not as clear as I would like – sorry.

The living room was so warm and cozy I just wanted to grab a book, a cup of chai, curl up and read.

I do mosaics, so I know exactly how time consuming and hard this was.

The house was filled with crazy colorful chaotic collections of tchochkes. I love this – I just wouldn’t want to dust it.



Chanchal’s gallery was the final room. After that we hung out in the garden for a bit and drank some amazing chai. We’ll definitely be making it to the Thursday night happening soon.