The ORIAVI Journal

Three things to ask for before you buy — the original text, a literal translation and the source — and why a translation app will not read calligraphy for you.

The longest night of the year, and why Iranians treat it as a beginning. Pomegranate, Hafez, and why Yalda has survived in diaspora households where Nowruz has thinned.

The seven S items and what each one means, what else belongs on the table, and how to build a Haft-Sin from scratch when nothing was handed down to you.

Bright, uncluttered, and still unmistakably Iranian. How to bring Persian character into a contemporary home without turning it into a theme — palette, room by room, and the mistakes worth...

The verses that appear most often on Persian walls, in the original and in plain English — and why the Rumi most people have read in translation may not be...

Two rules settle most rooms: span about two-thirds the furniture below, and centre the piece at eye level. A size chart, hanging heights, and what our own exchange requests reveal...

The winged figure above the kings of Persepolis has three competing explanations, and the one most people quote is the newest of them. A look at what the Faravahar meant...