UK historian and TV presenter Dan Snow visited Jordan recently to explore the legacy of Skills to Rebuild a Nation: The Syrian Stonemasonry Training Scheme Project, which was supported by the Cultural Protection Fund and led by World Monuments Fund (WMF).
The project trained Syrian refugees and local people in conservation stonemasonry and was part of a Cultural Protection Fund evaluation grant. WMF and Dan Snow’s History Hit are now working in collaboration to bring its story to an international audience through a series of commissioned short films.
Several years after the project was completed, four of the trainees are now working as stonemasons in a workshop in Mafraq. The films will feature Dan Snow talking to the four WMF-trained stonemasons about their training experience, the work which resulted from it, the issues they have faced, and the value of heritage to them as individuals.
The first day of filming took place at the masons’ yard in Mafraq, where British Council’s Cultural Protection Fund Co-ordinator Farah Alhasan, and the stonemasonry project coordinator Baraa Al Omoush, were able to join Dan to show him some of the brilliant work being done in the country.
Speaking about the work of Skills to Rebuild a Nation: The Syrian Stonemasonry Training Scheme project, Dan Snow said:
"This inspiring British Council funded project is restoring dignity to people displaced and dispossessed by violence while conserving skills that we so desperately need to restore a shattered heritage environment. It helps people, families, buildings and societies to heal."
