For something as ubiquitous as the kandora, you’d think there are enough people selling them in the UAE. But when Emirati entrepreneurs Khalid Al Huraimel and Saif Al Midfa first came up with the idea for a high-end luxurious traditional menswear brand, they found a massive gap in the market.
“The UAE is inundated with fashion brands and consumers are very aware of what’s on the market. And despite the country’s advancement in so many areas — from real estate, airlines and public transport — our own national wear has been the same for decades,” says Al Huraimel. “So we wanted to bring the kandora to international standards. Traditionally, if you wanted a kandora, you’d go to a tailor, and be faced with varying qualities and different levels of service. There are designer wears with fancy designs, but those cater to a very small market.
“Most people still prefer the simple white kandora. So our aim was to create a brand that was like a luxury brand, like an Armani or Prada, and also provide everything that a person wearing traditional attire would need, everything from innerwear, to sandals, wallets and the head gear.”
The first Bait Al Kandora, or House of Kandora, opened at Souq Al Bahar in Downtown Dubai two months ago, featuring a full collection of wardrobe essentials for the khaleeji man.
But Al Huraimel and Al Midfa wanted to give their new project a 21st century twist. Not satisfied with just having a store, they also launched a website two weeks ago, and introduced a first-of-its-kind service: The ability to create your own kandora online and order it without stepping out of your house.
Working with software developers for “many many months”, Al Huraimel says the website, baitalkandora.com, will also take measurements and guide clients through an easy step-by-step ordering process where each detail of the dress is recorded.
“This way, the next time you want to order a new kandora, the system would have already saved your details like size and fabrics and you can just change the colour or order the same one,” he says. “The UAE has one of the highest internet penetration rates and people don’t have as much time as before. So we wanted to make it easy.”
The online custom order service has two main targets: The busy customer and the woman who wants to shop for her children or husband and who is not comfortable walking into a shop where the attendants are usually mostly men. There’s also an option to have a tailor come to your home for measurements.
“You’d be surprised at the number of women who shop for their husbands or want to buy gifts for them. Sometimes, they avoid going into stores because they are not comfortable. That’s also why we have female attendants at our store,” says Al Huraimel, who hopes such attention to details, all based on him and friends’ personal experiences, and the quality of the product, will stand Bait Al Kandora apart.
Al Huraimel, who is also the CEO of the Sharjah-based environmental agency Bee’ah, says he’s worked with top manufacturers in Florence, Italy, with a focus on good quality leather and fabrics. The Bait Al Kandora logo is a reference to the falcon, an Emirati symbol of pride, strength and unity.
“We’ve actually had the idea for this brand for about ten years. But we got busy with other things. It was just in the last three years we seriously decided to work on it,” he says. “I think we’ve done well so far. The feedback we’ve received has been excellent. Many people said they were waiting for something like this for a long time, something to take Emirati menswear forward.”
Another Bait Al Kandora store will open in Sharjah next month and in Abu Dhabi before the end of the year. A mobile app is also in development while the focus for the next five years is to build on the product range, and take it across the UAE, and then the GCC.
“We want to be the leading khaleeji menswear brand in the region,” says Al Huraimel.
Go get yours
For more on the brand, go to BaitAlKandora.com
