With work by some of the most important Arab artists, including an ever-changing cast of life-size sculptures that occupy a theatre-style platform, Emirati filmmaker Abdulla Al Kaabi has created a colourful Dubai home brimming with all of his favourite things.
The most memorable movies — those that are peppered with moments that playback in our minds because they resonate with our hearts — create a visceral world filled with layers of sights and sounds. Gifted directors know that, sometimes, focusing on the small things gives the bigger picture more emotional depth.
One is immediately reminded of this when stepping into the sun-dappled garden of Emirati filmmaker Abdulla Al Kaabi’s Dubai home, which heightens the senses in cinematic style. Densely planted date palms cast welcome pools of shade while revealing slivers of powder-blue sky. Nature’s soundtrack — birdsong and cicadas on the cool winter breeze — is complemented by the strains of classical music playing inside the house. At first, it’s not apparent where the front door is; it is intentionally screened by a low wall with stepping stones to the left and right, delaying the moment of arrival for a few carefully calibrated beats.
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Once inside, visitors pass through a small entrance hall lined with ancient Persian artefacts, adding to the sense of discovery, and then into a series of lofty rooms filled with confidently curated furniture, antiques and Middle Eastern art. It’s a beguiling spectacle. Yet it wasn’t love at first sight when Al Kaabi viewed the house — rather a slow realisation that it could be a forever home. “Funnily enough, it was the first place I saw when I was house hunting, but I disregarded it because it was in such a bad state,” he says.
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After a year of searching fruitlessly, Al Kaabi decided this plot’s prime location in the beachside Jumeirah neighbourhood and its relatively large footprint meant it was worth upgrading the existing late-1980s house and scrubby, sand-filled garden. “When I came back I knew right away that it was the right one. I could just feel it,” he recalls. “Effectively, I bought a piece of land with a derelict house on it.”
Al Kaabi turned to the Canadian-Iranian architect and interior designer Farshad Mahoutforoush to realise his dream home, trusting him with everything from the dimensions of the house to the smallest design details. Both avid art collectors, the duo are used to collaborating, having co-founded the production company El Booma Films together. “Everyone told us to just tear it down, and build whatever we had in mind,” says Al Kaabi, “but I’ve always thought that a house has a soul. We ended up retaining and enhancing what was already there.”
“Jumeirah is a special neighbourhood and captures the spirit of Dubai,” adds Mahoutforoush. “I’m an advocate for preserving these old houses. It’s so unfortunate when they are destroyed.” Instead, he extended the original “box”, adding a double-height space at its centre (now a great room with mezzanines at either end — one housing the principal bedroom, the other a striking art installation) and several smaller structures in the garden. Following extensive landscaping, the latter is now a sylvan palm grove that wraps around the house, with a turquoise-tiled pool running the length of the building.
On the bedroom balconies, a bold take on traditional mashrabiya screens adds privacy and a decorative touch. The lacquered red slats of the shutters were inspired by Chinese temple lanterns and glow softly at night. “Farshad is a magician when it comes to proportion and decoration,” says Al Kaabi. “Even in the tiniest space, he can evoke the sense of it being a petit palais.”
Inside, the decoration blurs the lines between art and design, and many of the functional elements have a sculptural quality to them. “I love to mix diverse things together — there are no limitations,” says Mahoutforoush. “Whatever I do, I always ask myself ‘does it have the wow factor yet?’” The results are all the more impressive because they are extraordinary yet approachable; this is not a coolly intimidating gallery space. “It’s important that you are comfortable living around all these objects — that they’re not the dominant thing,” continues the designer. “They shouldn’t overwhelm you.” “It’s [also] very important that it feels like a home,” adds Al Kaabi. “I have friends who are also collectors and they have nice houses, but they can feel so cold and museum-like. I don’t like that.”
A champion of fellow creatives from a range of disciplines, Al Kaabi generously opens his home to others — including curious neighbours who have seen the striking façade take shape. House guests stay in a plush annexe with a bedroom that has direct access to the pool terrace. The main kitchen — purposefully kept separate from the house — is located at the opposite end of the swimming pool, its covered outdoor lounge serving as a gathering place for friends and family members, who drift freely through the garden.
“Growing up with six siblings, we always had a full house — you can imagine what the weekends were like!” says Al Kaabi with a laugh. “The brief here was to create a house for friends as much as for me. It was important to have different vibes in different corners of the house, so you can comfortably coexist and not disturb each other.” Another cherished childhood memory — the cooling shade of his grandfather’s palm garden in Fujairah — inspired the lush outdoor planting. “I told Farshad that I wanted to have a garden full of trees and see green above me,” he explains. “In a city like Dubai, where there’s so much sun, it’s a precious feeling. And then this idea swept into the house and we decided to put these trees here.”
He is referring to a row of fig trees that sit at the centre of the great room, emphasising the proportions of the space as they gently sway in the breeze generated by a gargantuan ceiling fan, which ensures there’s enough ventilation to keep them flourishing. Planted directly into the ground, the trees are one of several gestures that create an indoor-outdoor flow in the great room, including a run of glazed doors that lead to the pool terrace and high windows on the upper level.
“Figuring out how to catch the light here without it becoming a glazed box was very important,” says Mahoutforoush. “We actually blocked up some of the windows on the original plans to keep things cool and protect the art. Now, the light shifts beautifully throughout the day.”
While the overall mood in the house is languid, with defined areas for meditation and reading, Al Kaabi is hard at work in his cheerfully decorated study planning his next film: a touching story about the close connection between a Bedouin man and his camel as they survive in the desert.
“You know, we all seek shelter and calm,” he says. “Deep down, I am a country boy. I grew up in nature, although I’ve spent most of my adult life in cities. What I’ve created here is an oasis of tranquillity and it feels like I’ve come home.”
