Three square meters. That’s all the space Mohammad Rafi has in Tehran’s Grand Bazaar, Iran.
There, among shelves stacked to the ceiling, he keeps more than 50,000 colored pencils in around 200 different shades. His shop, Medad Rafi, has been open for more than 35 years, and over that time he has amassed true collectibles, some up to 70 years old.
But what’s truly amazing isn’t the quantity, but how he navigates it. There’s no catalog, no search function, and no inventory system: just his memory. If someone asks him for an exact shade, Rafi finds it in seconds, as if every pencil had its place marked on a map that only he can see.
That’s why his tiny shop has become a must-visit for artists, designers, and collectors who come from all over the world. They’re looking for the perfect shade and, along the way, take with them the image of a man who turned a tiny room into an archive of color.