10 highlights from Dubai Design Week 2025

The Lahore-based studio made its first appearance at Downtown Design with collections built on artistry and intricacy. Founded by Yousaf Shabaz and his mother, Saira, Strata introduced statement pieces with highly intricate craftwork that regional buyers recognise and value. 

What resonated was a sense of familiarity. The forms felt recognisable, even if the specific vocabulary was Pakistani rather than Emirati or Levantine. Shabaz drew on historical traditions but filtered them through contemporary design. The work looked rooted in the past yet entirely current.

The pieces spoke to audiences here because they share an aesthetic language: pattern, ornament, craft as virtue. Strata demonstrated what happens when South Asian design presents itself on its own terms rather than translating for international markets. Strata’s triumphant debut proved there is a real appetite in the region for work that comes from a specific place and tradition.

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In Venini’s third outing in Dubai Design Week, the brand presented three new modular lighting collections under the concept Amber Mirage. The Murano glassmaker worked in warm amber tones, from golden honey to deep brown, meant to evoke sand and desert light.

The region buys luxury craft, and Venini knows how to deliver it. The amber palette connected Italian glass tradition to the local context without overplaying the reference.

Palma was the most distinctive piece. The sculptural light drew inspiration from palm fronds, rendered in blown glass with a warm glow. It reads as both a decorative object and an architectural element, sized for the grand interiors this market builds.

Venini also showed Volcano, based on 1970s architectural glass panels, and Murea, a modular glass brick system. Both suit the large-scale projects common here: hotel lobbies, villas, retail spaces where lighting does heavy lifting. 

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Dubai-based sisters Mentalla and Asmaa Said, who founded design studio Doodle And The Gang, collaborated with HANDS Carpets on Postcards, a collection of hand-knotted rugs that translate personal memory into textile form.

The collection comprises ten designs drawn from five cities: Cairo, Beirut, Dubai, Riyadh and Varanasi. Khazzanz, the standout piece, takes its colour palette from Dubai’s Al Khazzan Water Tower in Al Bada’a, capturing the landmark’s distinctive pale blue and beige tones. Other pieces reference specific cultural markers: Aroosa nods to the foil-wrapped bride of Shay Al-Arosa tea, Bonjuseh to a Beiruti drink, Starry Night to Riyadh’s desert majlis, Najd to the city’s geometric architecture

The collaboration paired the sisters’ narrative approach with HANDS’ technical expertise in Bhadohi, India, home to one of South Asia’s largest hand-knotted carpet industries. The sisters visited the factory and worked directly with craftsmen for nearly a year. The collection also includes Marigold, a monumental wall hanging made from yarn offcuts salvaged during weaving, transforming factory remnants into a sculptural piece weighing up to 100kg.

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Cosentino abandoned the traditional product showcase this year. Instead of displaying material samples, the Spanish surfaces manufacturer commissioned Milan- and Dubai-based studio Etereo to create “1930,” a fully realised Art Deco lounge complete with a bar, piano area, and game tables.

The installation used Cosentino’s engineered stone and ultracompact surfaces as structural design elements. Vertical cladding, flooring, countertops and bespoke furniture were all fabricated from the company’s Silestone, Dekton, and Sensa ranges in earthy browns, blacks and jewel tones. The goal was atmosphere over specification sheets.

Art Deco has obvious appeal here. The style’s geometric precision, opulent materials and unapologetic glamour align with regional taste. Etereo drew on Italian modernists like Piero Portaluppi and Carlo Scarpa, filtering 1930s European design through contemporary fabrication.

More materials companies are moving from static displays to experiential spaces at trade fairs. Architects and designers want to see surfaces in context. Cosentino’s lounge demonstrated how engineered stone could define spatial character. Materials sell differently when they create environments.

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Jagdish Sutar, a Milan-based designer from Rajasthan, presented Objects of Legacy, a furniture collection made in his home state. The standout piece was Family Daybed, an oversized teak reinterpretation of the traditional Indian charpoy designed to encourage close gathering.

Sutar comes from a lineage of Rajasthani carpenters and trained at NABA in Milan. The work reflects both inheritances: carved lines and sculptural silhouettes rooted in Indian woodworking techniques, executed with the material refinement typical of Italian furniture design. The stand maintained visual consistency, with subtle textures and detailed joinery that revealed handwork over industrial production.

The collection found natural resonance in Dubai. The UAE’s significant Indian diaspora creates a market familiar with the cultural references, whilst the region’s luxury hospitality sector increasingly seeks furniture with authentic craft narratives rather than generic high-end pieces. Sutar’s work sits at the intersection: recognisable enough to feel culturally grounded, refined enough for contemporary interiors.

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1971 Design Space used its Downtown Design presentation to showcase two designers working with neglected natural materials. Nuhayr Zein, an Egyptian architect based in the UAE, showed a cabinet made from Leukeather, a plant-based material she developed from seed pods of a Mexican tree now growing locally.

The cabinet, titled 'Sara’ir', has multiple drawers. Its surfaces carry etched motifs from both Egyptian and Emirati visual traditions: ancient Egyptian symbols alongside palm trees and Al Ain Fort. The piece stands on gazelle legs, an animal present in both cultures’ heritage. Zein was born and raised in Al Ain.

The material itself is the real subject. Seed pods are typically discarded. Zein’s process transforms them into a workable surface suitable for furniture. The technique is labour-intensive, but it demonstrates that seed pods can serve as functional design elements. The exhibition also featured Lina Ghalib’s PlyPalm, which uses palm fronds. Both projects address whether discarded organic materials can become viable for local production.

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The UAE Designer Exhibition brought together 24 emerging designers working across the Emirates. Lebanese designer Zein Hageali, who studied product and industrial design at Central Saint Martins, presented Tawlitna, a modular table system inspired by traditional Syrian furniture. The project uses knock-down joinery so pieces can be assembled, disassembled and reconfigured. Hageali preserved the recognisable silhouette of Syrian tables whilst introducing contemporary colours, treating heritage as a starting point rather than something to simply reproduce.

The exhibition featured other designers taking similar approaches to regional references. Dania Najee showed a glass coffee table debossed with oyster shells, nodding to Dubai’s pearling history. Nourhan Rahhal presented furniture stacked like French pastries. Ahmad Alkattan displayed geometric pinewood tables sourced from India, Iran and Pakistan to reduce transport emissions. The work varied in execution, but the impulse to connect material and form to place was consistent across the show.

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Dubai Design Week 2025 featured more than thirty installations exploring community, sustainability and material innovation. The standout came from Abwab, the annual pavilion commission for designers across West, South and East Asia and the African continent. This year’s theme, “In the Details,” focused on ornament through textiles and narrative.

Maraj, a Bahrain-based platform founded by Latifa Alkhayat and Maryam Aljomairi, won with “Stories of the Isle and the Inlet.” The installation was ethereal: layered mesh textiles creating an enclosed space that felt both substantial and transparent. The work documented Nabih Saleh, a Bahraini island caught between Tubli’s wetlands and Sitra’s industrial zone.

Maraj worked with local embroiderers and tailors to create panels inspired by thob al nashil, a traditional garment. The embroidery depicted the island’s flora, fauna and surrounding waters, with native species and threatened ecosystems stitched across translucent fabric. Light filtered through, creating shifting shadow patterns.

The installation sat at the intersection of design, craft, art and memory, where ornament functioned as a documentary tool. By embedding ecological information within textile patterns, Maraj created a spatial record of what exists now but may disappear, combining oral histories from island residents with visual documentation through craft.

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Stellar Works and Calico Wallpaper made their Middle East debut at Downtown Design with a booth curated by Emirati architect Omar Al Gurg. Rather than a static product display, the space functioned as a hospitality environment with a café, bar, reading nook and lounge areas where visitors could sit for refreshments or test furniture in domestic settings.

Calico Wallpaper’s Atmosphere and Arcadia collections wrapped the space, whilst Stellar Works showed pieces by Yabu Pushelberg, Alessandro Munge and LAYAN. The approach reflected Al Gurg’s understanding of the local market: buyers here work on grand-scale hospitality projects where furniture needs to perform across hotel lobbies, residential towers and private majlis spaces. Both brands chose a regional curator rather than importing a booth design, letting clients test pieces in context rather than as isolated objects.

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Tashkeel’s Tanween Design Programme, now in its twelfth year, champions sustainable design rooted in Emirati material culture. This year’s seven designers worked with local manufacturers over 12 months.

Sarah Al Dulaimi, an Iraqi-British designer based in the UAE, showed Oculus, a lighting piece inspired by the abaya. The work appears opaque when unlit, revealing layers of black and coloured chiffon through dimmable LED when switched on. Al Dulaimi sourced fabric from reclaimed offcuts from Abu Dhabi tailors, transforming textile waste into material for storytelling. Rather than treating the abaya as a visual reference, she explored its underlying concepts: privacy, choice, transformation, concealment and revelation.

Other standout pieces included Hessa Alghandi’s Lamah, a pendant light made from repurposed palm branches, and Clock & Cloud Studio’s Loodo, a low table crafted from bio-composite using desert sand and natural dyes.

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