Mass Imperfections

At Dubai Design Week 2016 Palestinian architects Elias and Yousef Anastas designed Mass Imperfection, a pavilion composed of several handmade olive wood modules.

Stone: Origins and Future in Architecture

On June 12 and 13, 2025, IUAV University of Venice will host "Stone is…," an international forum entirely dedicated to natural stone. Organized by PNA, this event aims to thoroughly explore the material's enduring value and sustainability, featuring insights from internationally renowned speakers.

Sponsored content

Mass Imperfections by Palestinian architects Elias and Yousef Anastas is composed of several handmade olive wood modules assembled into a structure that bears resemblance to both a piece of traditional Palestinian embroidery from a village in the hills of Judea and to a prop from the set of a sciencefiction film from the 1970.

In order to elaborate Mass Imperfections, the brothers worked with Luay Nassrallah, an artisan from Beit Jala, who uses a machine to cut the olive wood. In Palestine, the souvenir industry is a sprawling moneymaking machine. Pilgrims are brought into cities such as Bethlehem, and pressured into buying ‘authentic’ or ‘holy’ olive wood trinkets that are often mass-produced elsewhere and have little to do with Palestine.

But the project does not fetishize arts and crafts. It is not simply a critique of mass production. It is a proposal: it suggests new ways to blend the human and the machine.

Mass Imperfections reintroduces human error as a fundamental element of creativity. The glitch is at the basis of its creative process: temporary malfunctions of machines trigger unheard of ways of seeing reality. The structure, in fact, is a constellation of glitches. It celebrates humanity in its mass imperfections.

Mass Imperfections, Dubai, UAE
Program: pavilion
Architects: AAU Anastas
Curators: Elias & Yousef Anastas
Dubai Design Week 2016
Area: 7,7 sqm

What if the edge could connect?

FLAT is the flush window born from a deep dedication to design; it speaks the language of architects, integrating seamlessly into diverse contexts.

Sponsored content

Mass Imperfections

At Dubai Design Week 2016 Palestinian architects Elias and Yousef Anastas designed Mass Imperfection, a pavilion composed of several handmade olive wood modules.

Stone: Origins and Future in Architecture

What if the edge could connect?

Latest on News

Latest on Domus