Laila Gohar Is Inspiring Us to Celebrate Our Own Made-Up Holidays
Elle Magazine | 14.11.2026 00:18
6 min read
On Avenue George V in Paris, in the lobby of the Hotel Prince de Galles, is a festive installation that looks straight out of a Wes Anderson movie. It’s a pop-up fashioned to look like the counter of a vintage apothecary, with rows of cup-handled drawers lining a dark wooden wall, each numbered and labeled, with an attendant standing in front in a dark green uniform and cap. Flanking it on both sides are glass casings with Christmas trees—made from light-blue fabric and white ribbons—inside, surrounded by metallic ant figurines.
The whimsical, imaginative display is part of artist Laila Gohar’s ongoing collaboration with The Luxury Collection, the hotel group, which boasts the Prince de Galles as one of its many properties. For the holidays, Gohar curated an advent calendar with each of its 24 windows offering a peek into a different hotel in the collection, from Madrid, Kyoto, Dubai, and more. In a way, this Parisian pop-up, with set designs by Alix Bortoli, is a life-size extension of the work. Similar versions appear in The Joseph in Nashville, Tennessee, Solaz in Los Cabos, and The Laurus in Singapore.
Gohar tapped her artistic circle for the project. “When people ask me, ‘Who inspires you?’ my answer is always my friends,” she says. The advent calendar’s exterior is illustrated by New York-based Joana Avillez and fashioned to look like a hotel out of a storybook. (It’s not based on any particular one in real life, though.) “When you open it up, inside of the flaps, there are all these little vignettes,” Gohar explains to ELLE. “It’s like all these imagined little scenarios, and some of them have a little bit of humor, but it’s a little bit of a Where’s Waldo thing. It’s also kind of in the style of Richard Scarry. Do you remember those books from childhood?”
Inside each window is a chocolate from Casa Bosques—founded by designer Rafael Prieto, another one of Gohar’s pals—featuring flavors from each destination. “For example, for The Suiran in Kyoto, the chocolate featured inside has black sesame and other flavors associated with Japan and with that city,” Gohar explains.
It’s a fitting undertaking for Gohar, who first earned renown for works of art made with food and has since developed her own design studio, Gohar World. (The brand just opened up a shop on Elizabeth Street in New York.) “While I care very much about food, for me, it’s more about creating a particular feeling in a space, and that can be through lots of different mediums,” she says.
That medium could be an advent calendar full of chocolates or a historic Art Deco hotel like the Prince de Galles, with its majestic marble details and mosaic tiles. ELLE caught up with Gohar one morning in Paris to discuss her latest projects, holiday gifting, and her hosting tips.
The Luxury Collection
Did you have an advent calendar growing up? What memories do you have of opening one every day?
Yeah. I think there’s something nostalgic about advent calendars and you have something to look forward to every day. What I like about it is that there’s all this excitement around it, but you also have to practice a little restraint, which as a kid, I don’t know if I really did. I would blast through all of them. My mom was like, “You have to wait!” I think a lot of people grew up with them, but adults love them too. It’s very giftable, which I thought would be good for the holidays.
Your brand, Gohar World, has some really great gifts out right now, like the pearl serving utensils. How are you approaching gifting this year?
I love to give gifts that feel almost like an heirloom, like something that was maybe in your family. Especially with my friends, we think about that a lot. What are we creating that can be passed down from generation to generation? What is something that is really considered, that took a lot of time to create? I love thinking about gifts through that lens.
There’s a lot of pressure around giving gifts for the holidays, and obviously the way we shop now is very online. So I like to create things that feel a little bit slower and more craft-based.
You’re also a hosting pro. What are your tips for hosting for the holidays?
For the holidays, or just in general, I always say that people are only able to relax and have a good time in your home or around you if you’re relaxed and having a good time. I think that’s really what it comes down to. You have to set yourself up for success, and that means you’re not getting involved with a really difficult cooking project that you’re really nervous about—you’re going to be running the stove all the time. That is not good. Just figure out how to create an environment that feels relaxing for you, and therefore everyone will relax and hopefully have a good time.
I’m sure you do this all the time, but do you have a favorite gathering or event that you’ve hosted?
Oh my God, I’ve hosted so many. I write a column for The Financial Times, “How to Spend It,” and the premise of it is made-up holidays, because I just like the idea of thinking of a random excuse to get people together. I think there’s a lot of pressure around the holidays, but I like just celebrating random everyday things. For example, throwing a party because I saw really beautiful dahlias in the market and I think we should have a dahlia party. We’re going to have a soup party because it’s the coldest night of the year, or we will have a potato party because there are new potatoes in the market and I love potatoes.
So have you done the potato party?
Yeah. All of those are real ones. They’re not hypothetical. And I’ve done a million random things that I just kind of make up. I think there’s a reason to celebrate obviously around the holidays, but also every day. If you take a minute, there’s always a reason to spread joy and a reason to celebrate.
Have any of your recent travels inspired any of your work?
Last week, I was in Dakar, Senegal, and I’m participating in a biennial that’s happening there soon. In Senegal, people have unbelievable style, and you see it in just how they carry themselves and how they put outfits together. They just have this swag, and I think it makes for really great people-watching. I was inspired by people’s sense of self and how they move, how they carry themselves, how confident they appear.
What can you share about your piece in Dakar?
It’s for the Dakar Biennale, which is the most significant art biennial in Africa. I’m from Egypt, so it was really important for me to be there. For the project, I’ve created a tapestry carpet—it’s kind of like a quilt. I teamed up with a friend of mine, Rym Beydoun; she has a clothing brand called Super Yaya. Together we created this textile that transforms a room in the biennial into a meditation space. It’s inspired vaguely by prayer carpets. Senegal is a Muslim country, and there are a lot of different carpets there, but also all over the Muslim world.
We created 25 unique carpets in the prayer carpet size, which is small, and then we sewed them all together to create this really big composition. The idea was to create a little space of refuge. The biennial’s in this big, beautiful building, and we just wanted this little corner where people could just sit with themselves for a second and spend a little time with themselves.
Are there any art, films, books, or music that are inspiring you currently?
I think there’s inspiration everywhere you look. It depends on how you look. But I love to notice beauty or inspiration in the least expected places. Obviously there’s tons of inspiration in museums and in films and all that, but I like to notice random accidental beauty. I’m a little embarrassed to admit this, but a thing that I do is when I’m sitting on the train in New York, I kind of look at every person and I try to find one thing that I think is beautiful about them.
It’s a fun way to pass time. I see an old man sitting on the train, and I’m like, “His hair is really good,” or something. You notice all sorts of crazy things that you never would [if you didn’t] look at the person that way.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
The Luxury Collection The Luxury Collection x Laila Gohar Advent Calendar
