The hands behind the work
Burak Altay works at a wooden bench with pliers, a drill, a small bowl of silver wire and a great deal of patience.
The technique is called kakma: silver driven into the body of the bead until the two become one surface. Nothing here is cast in a mould and no pattern is printed. Every point of silver you see on a tesbih was placed by hand, and placed again if it sat a hair out of line.
It is slow work, and it is meant to be. A tesbih is held for years, turned bead by bead through the fingers. It should be made the same way.
Altay Atelier is the workshop of master Burak Altay. He makes tesbih by hand and inlays them with pure silver. Each piece is made once, and each is sold in conversation, not from a shelf.
See the workbench
