The Ladies Furrier

Mr. Dikran Tamirian is a furrier and a storyteller. His epic life story is one of resilience and drive. He was born around the end of the 1920s, and his fur atelier, in Bellevue, Mount Lebanon, is still bustling with activity.

The furrier first learned the craft from his mother, Mayranouche. A twelve-year old fleeing the Armenian genocide, she was kidnapped by the Turks and placed in the village-town Severek. She met Hovhannès and ran away with him to Aleppo. In 1930, she heard that her brother, Agop Kermezian, was alive and living in Paris. He was a furrier for Jean Patou and other notorious couturiers. She traveled to him and learned his trade, while pursuing a hairdressing diploma. Three years later, she settled with her husband and son in Beirut where she started working at a salon de coiffure. Soon enough, she decided to dedicate herself to fur couture, and her brother sent her a sewing machine from Paris. At the time a few fur houses were establishing themselves in Beirut, reinforcing the city’s reputation as a capital of style and refinement, which attracted locals and foreigners. The oldest furrier in Beirut was the renowned Gabriel Djanandji, later joined by his sons. He opened a prestigious boutique on Bab Idriss, at the heart of the city.

Dikran’s family lived in one bedroom, in an apartment with other families on Rue de l’Armée. The room was divided between a living area and the atelier, where Dikran assisted his mom by pedaling to activate the sewing machine, as there was no engine at the time. The elegant ladies of Beirut’s high society came to the atelier for their fittings. In 1946, Dikran decided to sail away to Europe to perfect his craft. He spent a year in Paris, six months in London, then two years in Berlin where he did an apprenticeship with his uncle. In 1949, Dikran set up a vast atelier shop, maison Marina (Mayranouche’s surname) on George Picot Street. He traveled to Paris, London and Frankfort to purchase his furs, and learned their treatment and cleaning in the United States. In 1967 he gained exclusive representation of Christian Dior Haute Fourrure in Lebanon and held fashion shows at Phoenicia hotel’s nightclub Le Paon Rouge. At the start of the civil war his atelier was vandalized and all his belongings, including appliances, machines and merchandise, were stolen. With the support of his suppliers who had become his friends, and a boutique put at his disposal by the Summerland hotel, he started over to reach new successes. And the story goes on.