About/Process
People
Contact
©2026 K.Siddiqi & Co.
Serai by Allied Bank Limited
A Numismatic Experience Pavillion at Lahore Literary Festival ‘25
Allied Bank Limited, one of Pakistan’s largest and oldest banks - is a frequent patron of arts and culture in the country. For the Lahore Literary Festival - perhaps Pakistan’s most comprehensive and international crossroads of books, minds and talks they wanted to rethink how their corporate presence would appear at the event.
Wanting to break out of the typical bank/ atm parked on the lawn they gave me free reign to propose and design a concept fitting for the event. I was clear about what I wanted to create; a pavilion - not a booth, that very subtly held the character of the bank but also would be a fun place to visit and hang out.
The experience was pulled together by a few independent spaces/ mini-experiences:
1. A custom vitrine display housing the first notes and coins issued by Pakistan, along with custom designed pamphlets for visitors detailing the story of Pakistan’s first numismatic items. We were fortunate to be able to get help directly from the State Bank
2. A wishing wall - where visitors left wishes around either their financial, or literary dreams.
3. A proper coffee shop experience. Polymath - one of Lahore’s finest coffee spots was close to launching but not public yet - and I convinced them to be the coffee partner for ABL’s guests and visitors at the festival.
4. A quite corner to sit and solve a puzzle - arather difficult but custom-designed puzzle that had 112 pieces and no artwork - just a solid gradient custom set in the ABL colors. Much more difficult than I anticipated it to be.
5. Books to cozy up with.
Everything was designed and constructed in 6 days.
Structural Layout + Design
Structural integrity was a stern internal goal for us, which is why we over-specced the reinforcement of the pavilion walls with MS framework, welded in two locations before assembly on site.
I also wanted to make sure that we got lots of sunlight, which luckily - the ABL board also wanted more of, so the initial slit like windows were expanded into beautiful large glass for the winter sun.
Numismatics: Currency and Coins and The History of Pakistan’s Earliest Money.
For the meat of the experience, I wanted to tie in and connect the story to the bank in a way that didn’t scream “Look at me! We are a bank!” For this reason I thought - for some wild reason that I should be able to share Pakistan’s earliest currency notes as well as the earliest coins the country ever saw.
For the actual currency, I dug deep and found a connection at the State Bank of Pakistan’s Museum in Karachi, whose team was more than kind enough to scan actual notes and send them to me. We digitally upsampled and printed copies of them to size, to be displayed in the custom vitrine we designed. Lots of research, down to the publications that mentioned Pakistan’s notes’ history - was dug through.
Perhaps the most interesting but was the luck we had with sourcing the first coins Pakistan ever issued. These came to us by way of