Dubai Design Week 2025

Projects by both established and emerging designers focused on materiality, with designs exploring material contrasts and demonstrating the creative potential of local resources.

Graduates of Dubai-based art facility Tashkeel’s Tanween design programme, which focuses on sustainable design and furniture, looked to typically dismissed or underused local materials. Emirati poet and artist Nasser Alghawi used bio-resin to transform date pits into an ornate chandelier and table. Meanwhile, the Loodo table by Clock & Cloud (UAE) features a base of staggered domes – which emulate shifting dunes – cast from layers of a desert-sand biocomposite dyed with turmeric, charcoal, indigo and henna.

The ARDH Collective (UAE) created an architectural pavilion to demonstrate how material, memory and landscape can interact to bridge heritage and innovation. The contemplative space showcased DuneBlocks, the company’s modular construction units, which are made from DuneCrete, a low-carbon concrete produced using desert sand.

Italian studio Draga&Aurel made its debut at Downtown Design Dubai with a collection of jewel-like furniture crafted from resin, concrete and Murano glass to create a feast of visual and textural contrasts. Similarly, the Mille Feuille collection by Design And (UAE) is made of layers of grained ash wood blocks and glazed terracotta tiles to emulate the French dessert. A floor lamp from the collection emits a diffused warm light, illuminating the towering layers.

Immersive pavilions and expressive furniture nodded to regional traditions and heritage.

The Abwab pavilion, Stories of the Isle and the Inlet, by Bahraini-American interdisciplinary practice Maraj, explored the cultural and ecological layers of Bahrain’s Nabih Saleh island. The textile-wrapped layered structure drew inspiration from traditional Bahraini thobe al nashil. Combining oral history with the symbolic embroidery of local artisans, the pavilion depicted native species, seasonal cycles and cultural narratives of the island.

This year’s winning Urban Commissions pavilion by Some Kind of Practice (UAE) asked: “When does a threshold become a courtyard?” Hoping to maintain the contextual structure of a courtyard, the pavilion consisted of a courtyard built on concrete and encased in palm fronds, with a roof of corrugated metal sheets that open into a wind tunnel, allowing light and air to flow in. Using off-the-shelf and natural materials with traditional stacking techniques observed in the desert, the pavilion demonstrated how architecture has evolved in the region since the 20th century.

The arched wooden form of Dania Najee’s (Jordan) Al Shasha coffee table is inspired by Dubai’s history as a fishing village, while its glass surface, debossed with oyster shells, nods to the city’s pearling heritage. The Wasl shelf by One Third Studio (Dubai) features circular platforms inlaid with khoos marquetry – a technique blending traditional Emirati palm frond weaving with marquetry – to fuse heritage craft with modern form. Presenting a novel take on playful modularity, Adnan Arif’s (UAE) Sil coffee table draws on the eastern and Islamic visual traditions with magnetic wooden ornaments that, when stacked around the table legs, reveal minimalist geometric patterns that can be customised, painted and endlessly reconfigured.

Thoughtful reinterpretations of traditional spaces and furniture from the region encouraged connection and conviviality. See Spaces: Cultivating Connection for more.

In Objects of Legacy by Jagdish Sutar (India), an oversized Family Daybed crafted from teak reimagines traditional Charpoy daybeds, intending to encourage people to gather together.

Informed by the west African concept of the griot – a living archive or library – Bootleg Griot (Dubai) created Ilé Griot, a home-like space for storytelling sessions, talks and screenings. Similarly, reinterpretations of traditional Arabic gathering spaces, or majlis, by Boo Design Studio (Qatar) and Ajzal Studio (Dubai) provided places for conversation, connection, rest and storytelling.