About Persiahaus
Why we exist
We believe Persian and Iranian culture deserves to be written about the way serious magazines write about anything they love: precisely, warmly, without mystification. Not as an exotic backdrop, and not as a political slogan, but as a living body of ideas, objects and poems that still has a great deal to say.
We believe heritage is a working material. The column, the garden plan, the tile, the couplet: these are not relics to be admired behind glass but forms to be understood and used. The Bauhaus asked artists and craftspeople to work together toward a total work. We ask the same of writing, poetry and image.
Heritage is not a costume. It is a set of forms you can still use.
We write in English, so that anyone can come in, and we keep the Persian close, so that nothing is lost on the way. Every Persian word is explained when it first appears. Every translation tells you who made it.
What we do
The Journal
Essays, discourse and dispatches on Persian and Iranian culture: art, architecture, language, food, film and ideas, written precisely and without mystification.
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Poetry
The Greats and contemporary poets, in Persian beside English, each poem with a note for newcomers and the translator always named.
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The Print Room
Original prints from Persiahaus Studio and, in time, invited artists. Printed to order and shipped worldwide.
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How the prints are made
Every print is made to order. When you buy a work it is printed by our print-on-demand partner and sent straight to you, so nothing is overproduced and nothing waits in a warehouse.
Prices, sizes, taxes and delivery times for your country are shown in the bag and at checkout. [Awaiting supplier confirmation: papers, sizes and printing method.]
Visit the Print RoomOur principlesاصول
Precision over mystery
We explain rather than mystify. If we are not sure of a fact, we leave it out.
Translation, not quotation
We carry old forms into new materials instead of pasting old motifs onto new products.
Original and English, side by side
Poems appear in Persian alongside a translation, with the translator always named.
Made by the house
Our prints are designed by Persiahaus Studio, and we are building an honest, open invitation for other artists to join.
For the diaspora and the curious
We write for people who grew up with this culture and for people meeting it for the first time, and we assume both are intelligent.
Write to us
Questions, pitches for the Journal, translations, press and partnerships.