Dubai Design District (d3) will host the second chapter of ‘UAE Design Stories: The Next Generation from the Emirates’ at the London Design Fair that is set to run from 20 to 23 September, 2018 in the Old Truman Brewery, E1. The exhibition is supported by the UAE Ministry of Culture and Knowledge Development and is curated by renowned Emirati product designer Khalid Shafar.

For Chapter 2, the participating designers were invited to delve into the historical photographic archives of the UAE, available through various resources, to unearth a pictorial history surrounding the region’s nomadic roots.

Designers were tasked with interpreting these pieces from the archives into modern day designs, taking their inspirations from the UAE’s ancestors. These creatives had to bring to life products and pieces using modern day design methodologies and processes, showcasing contemporary interpretations of items that held great value to those nomadic families for whom traveling though deserts and oceans was inherent and living in various landscapes and conditions a lifestyle.

The result, we hope, is testimony to the region’s evolution in the field of design.

Abdulla Almulla presents ‘Tie-In’, inspired by a type of traditional house or “Al Areesh” called “Al Areesh Al Mogasas”. It is an ode to the region’s distinctive temporary summer hut made from palm leaves. The nomadic idea of a rope connector has been morphed into an industrial manufactured node thanks to modern day tools. Each node is designed to fit three vertical elements of different heights in different axes. This allows one to assemble various scales, and the result of our exploration highlights a low curved seating partition composed of vertical elements of different heights and connected by modular nodes. The form of a curve demonstrates the flexibility of our methodology to be ortho or organic.

Designers will create unique commissions for London, each inspired by this exquisite and treasured archive. The exhibition will then travel to Paris as part of the UAE-France Cultural Dialogue programme, before returning to Dubai for Dubai Design Week from 12 to 17 November, 2018.