Our Story

Vision

To empower thousands of crafters, artisans, makers, and creators across Pakistan with a means to market and sell their handmade products to respective buyers in the local and international arena, thus creating income generation opportunities and growth.

Mission

Mission To curate a marketplace dedicated to makers across Pakistan and to make ‘handmade crafts’ more accessible to buyers.

The Story

Esnaf, is an online marketplace founded FOR crafters, artists, makers and other creatives by The Crafter’s Guild in Pakistan. Esnaf is Turkish for ‘guild’. Pronounced ISS-NAAF.

Handmade crafts are time consuming and meticulously crafted pieces which require patience, dedication, and a state of peace-clarity. These tie to Sufi influences and traditions. Handmade work is heartfelt, and stirs the soul. Each piece has a memory, every artisan has a story.

Led by Varah Musavvir (founder, The Crafter’s Guild and Firefly), the core team comprises of outreach, data and statistics under Muhammad Hamza Zahid, and all web development under the expertise of Muhammad Ali Khan (MarketFront).

There are countless others from the community who have given strength to Esnaf, to come alive.

The Logo – Branding

The hues of purple represent nobility, spirituality, devotion, grandeur, creativity, and wisdom. The pomegranate itself symbolizes wealth and wellness — which of course is the essence of our craft community! A pomegranate’s seeds are all interlinked and interconnected, each one complimenting the other – similar to the foundation of the crafting community in Pakistan. The five seeds within the logo also hold a special meaning for the ventures currently a part of the network: Firefly, The Crafter’s Guild, Food for your Face, The Willow, and The Willow Tree Paperie – all of which collectively support Smile Sunshine (a social welfare initiative).