When Alexandrians celebrate the national day of their glorious harbour city, on 26 July, as they celebrate the foundation of the city on 24 April, Fathy will send her store's flower chariot to stroll through the city from quarter to quarter to join the festivities.
“The idea is to recall the flower imprint that was for long a part of the identity of the city that has one of the most impressive botanical gardens in the country – namely the Antoniadis Gardens,” Fathy said.
Visits to the Antoniadis Gardens are an integral part of the childhood memories of Fathy in the late 1960s and early 1970s. “It was such a spectacular place to go to, and it did have a unique selection of cut flowers and plants,” she said.
Situated in the east of Alexandria, Antoniadis Gardens is considered one of the oldest botanical gardens of the city, and for that matter, of Egypt.
With over 43 feddans, the Gardens still carry the name of one of the 19th-century prominent Greek-Alexandrian cotton merchants, Johan Antoniadis, who bought it in the 1870s.
However, botanical historians argue that its origin goes back to earlier centuries. About a century ago, upon the will of Antoniades, the Gardens, which had a unique and rare collection of flowers, palms, and other trees, were passed to the Alexandrian municipality.
“It used to be a glorious garden, but unfortunately, during the second half of the last century, it went through a phase of decline. However, it was renovated and reopened last year,” Fathy said. “This was parallel with a decline of the space given to flowers and gardens all around the city.”
“In my recollection of the city, for the most part, there were always gardens around every single apartment building; small as they might be, these gardens were always rich with Egyptian roses and jasmines; the breath of these jasmines in particular was so distinct that one could always recognize,” she recalled.
This, she added, went through a severe decline, as of the late 1980s, when the emphasis shifted from building small apartment buildings and villas surrounded with gardens to building high-rising apartment buildings.
Around the same time, she said, there was a decline in the number of flower shops that used to be part of the profile of the city for centuries, “especially in the part that is known as the cosmopolitan Alexandria”.
It was this floral side of the city that got Fathy herself interested in flowers from an early age. “I think it was inevitable to pick up this passion given the fact that I grew up in houses, be it my parents’ or my grandparents’, whose balconies are full of and surrounded with flowers and where vases of flowers were integral to the interiors of every single one of these houses,” she said.
It was not until she was in the second half of her career with international banking that Fathy one day woke up with a decision to drop this career and delve into the world of flowers. That was around late 2010, “which was not an easy moment for the floral business in Alexandria yet.”
“I think this was part of the challenge; I know I could bring something to the table and help re-start a trend that had been withering for decades,” she said. And off she went to fresh floristry studies in Paris and Geneva.
“The idea was to start a business on the right footing and to make it work, not just because I wanted this business to be successful but certainly because I wanted it to be inviting to expand the interest in flowers at the largest scale possible,” she said.
Back in Alexandria, she started White Jasmine as a tribute to her maternal grandmother, who was so fond of these delicate blossoms and their very definite scent. “I used to collect the jasmines from her garden fresh with an amazing smell and thread them together in a necklace-like shape that she would wear for the evening,” she recalled.
“Nothing beats Egyptian white jasmines; they were always, and they still are, among the prettiest of the country’s floral variety,” she said. “This is why I am so fond of doing Jasmine arrangements workshops in the great Jasmine gardens in the governorate of Al-Gharbiya during their harvest season; and these are always in a firm high attendance.”
Workshops are integral to the project of White Jasmine. "I do workshops with different groups from those who are hoping to join the business one way or the other, those who just have a hobby, or school children, children with special needs - among others," she said.
During the past 15 years of her new career, Fathy never thought of White Jasmine as just a flower shop. “This was not the idea because when all is said and done, Alexandria had already had incredible and established flower shops,” she said. The idea, she argued, was to bring something extra that relates to the soul of bringing back the floral imprint of the city.
So, she said, while selling flowers to individuals “with advice on what to select for which occasion and how to make an arrangement on a budget,” and while she makes decorative arrangements for the five-star hotels of the city, Fathy has been very invested in making flowers something to grab as a gift for every occasion.
“At the beginning, it was essentially the Christmas and Easter arrangements that we used to make, but soon enough I decided that every holiday is a season for flower- gifting,” she said. She started making cookies or chocolate arrangements with flowers, Ramadan lanterns with flower assortments, and for the upcoming Eid Al-Adha that falls on 27 May, Fathy is making flower boxes with sheep-shaped candles as she has been doing the past few years.
“I am impressed that they have been selling well; I think somehow people are really back into flower- gifting,” she said.
Fathy does not have a specific market reasoning for the growing interest in flowers. She said that this could partially be attributed to the fact that it is still possible to have nice on-budget gift flowers that would be much more affordable compared to other gifts for birthdays or other occasions, and it could be the growing influence of the social media marketing schemes of some flower stores.
“I am not sure exactly when this started or why it started; I just know that when I compare things today to where they were when I started joining the market, there is a much bigger interest today than before,” she said. "I have seen boys coming into the store asking to have a simple and inexpensive arrangement to offer to their moms to make up after a moment of tension; this is relatively new since I came to the business," she added.
According to Fathy, this increasing interest has not been intimidated by the increasing prices of flowers, local and imported. "We can still find a way around it and make a pretty arrangement that does not cost a fortune for those who have limited budgets," she said.
“This growing interest might be a trend, or it might be a re-embracement of the beauty of nature gifts, I have no idea, but for sure it is there,” she said.
In one of the most recent manifestations of the growing interest in flower-gifting, she said, coffee stores are making deals with flower shops, including hers, to create coffee cup holders adorned with the usually simple and inexpensive flower arrangements so that one could send a morning or afternoon coffee to a friend, a relative, or a lover with flowery wishes.
With such a spike, Fathy said that the time has come for Antoniadis to host a spring flowers exhibition similar to the one that happens in Cairo every year.
“It is a dream project that I am working on with many people, and I am really hopeful that we will see it happen for Spring 2027,” she said.
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