ITS IN THE BAG- DESIGNER TAREK WAKED TAKES US BEHIND THE SCENES OF PUGLIA'S DESIGN UNDERGROUND
The Secret Side of the Puglian Riviera — Where Real Design Is Born
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Each week we give you a behind the scenes look into the people places and cultures that inspire our brand. Travel is a key part of why we love our company so much as we get to work with artisans from all over the world while eating and sleeping our way throughs the countries we visit for work and pleasure.
Far from the crowded beaches and manicured villas, another Puglia hums quietly — a raw, creative frontier shaping the future of design. Here, luxury is not performed; it’s practiced. This is the hidden Riviera where design doesn’t follow trends — it reinvents them.
One of its defining voices is Tarek Waked, the Lebanese architect-designer whose journey spans continents, conflicts, and creative rebirths.
“It all started with the bag,” he says.
From Beirut to the Adriatic — The Birth of Tally Marks
Waked left Lebanon during one of the many wars that marked this land. After six years of architectural studies between Lebanon and Belgium, followed by internships in Milan and London, he moved through studios in Qatar and Paris — designing palaces, penthouses, and private offices between the Gulf and Monte Carlo.
Today, he lives and works in southern Italy, restoring masserie and reimagining the forgotten trulli of Puglia with the same sculptural sensibility that defines his objects — pieces that sit somewhere between architecture and adornment.
Yet Tally Marks was not born in abundance, but in collapse.
Amid Lebanon’s financial crisis in 2020, Waked sought to create something beautiful while everything else was falling apart — a gesture of resistance through creation, and a way to keep local craftsmanship alive.
It began, fittingly, with a bag.
The piece originated as part of his master thesis on craftsmanship in the contemporary city, created in collaboration with local artisans. “Everyone stopped me asking about it,” he recalls. That holster-style design became his signature — evolving through three case studies and four prototypes into The Holster Bag™, the first piece in what would become Tally Marks.
The name itself is poetic: each “tally” a mark of trial, revision, and endurance — until perfection was found.
Holster Bag Matt & Fringe Size 25
A Second Skin and a Symbol of Survival
Tally Marks is more than a brand; it’s a Luxury Nomadic Design Practice born from resilience. It is also a manifesto — a reminder that design is not a product, but a process: a way of remembering how to build, feel, and survive.
Waked’s designs merge architectural discipline with sensual freedom, translating structure into emotion. The Holster Bag™ doesn’t hang or dangle — it wraps the body. A harness of style and survival, it becomes a second skin — both protective and intimate, both weapon and ornament.
Even the interiors — and the box itself — are red.
“Because red is the color of your heartbeat,” Waked says. “Your eyes use more energy to process red — it’s alive.”
Tally Marks Jewelry Collection
From Melting Crosses to Making Statements
Jewelry, like much in Waked’s world, was an accident that became destiny. He melted a collection of inherited gold crosses and reforged them into new forms — objects of identity, not religion. Partnering with a father-and-daughter goldsmith team in Ostuni, he created the first Nut and Bolt Bracelet, bridging mechanics and emotion, precision and passion.
Religious relics became mechanical symbols. Emotion turned to architecture. Each piece became a study in contrasts — restraint and release, solidity and seduction, the mechanical and the human.
From this fusion emerged The Nut Bolt Series — a language of wearable architecture forged in 925 silver, handcrafted in Puglia.
Today, Tally Marks stands as a young emblem of new luxury — one that values narrative over novelty, craftsmanship over production, and meaning over excess. Every piece, from bag to bracelet, is handmade between Beirut (leather) and Puglia (silver), preserving the artisan spirit that binds both cities.
In a world obsessed with labels, Waked reminds us that true design is not about what you wear —
it’s about what binds you, and how that binding sets you free.
INFO@TALLYMARKS.COM
Shop Tarek's genius collection online.
Have a great week!
MICHOU
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