There seems to be a desire in Dubai to keep its best places secret — so only by word of mouth will you find out about them.
I really shouldn't write about The Antique Museum in the Al Quoz industrial area because Fakih N.P., the managing director of Fakih Group, which owns the gigantic and diversified gift shop, wants it to remain a secret.
In pictures: Antique Museum
Don't be fooled by the name — the Antique Museum is neither a museum nor a store selling antiques. It's a 65,000-square-foot warehouse where containers from abroad are unloaded several times a month before the goods are sorted, stocked and distributed to nearly 30 retail outlets around the UAE.
Dusty ride
When and if you find the place, get ready for a dusty adventure, as the warehouse is a maze of shoulder-wide passageways with goods imported from 27 countries and covered with dust (don't wear nice clothes). And be ready to sweat, as some areas don't have any ventilation and are kept really warm by the heat from the hundreds of multicoloured lamps and lanterns hanging from the ceilings.
Fakih Group handles products from 12 countries, such as carpets and pottery from India, wood and stone carvings from Indonesia, stitched items and statues from Thailand, perfume bottles and bamboo crafts from China, wooden masks from Africa, porcelain and lacquer crafts from Vietnam, pashmina shawls from Nepal, hanging carpets and puppets from Myanmar and woven romblon place mats, and buffalo horns and mother-of-pearl and bamboo crafts from the Philippines.
Egyptian wooden statues vie for space with Yemeni swords and jewellery and rows of linen, cushions and wood-carved ornaments from South East Asia. Fakih showed me pashmina ranging from Dh8 to Dh18,000, the luxurious ones being made from goat hair and meant to keep warm in the mountains of Nepal.
The museum opened nine years ago and was transformed into an Ali Baba sort of cave over the years. Nothing is well arranged and kept clean there but that contributes to making the visit a different experience from the pristine shopping malls. You'll have to step over boxes, walk through dark corners and get dirty to come up with a treasure to take home. The experience conjures up old souqs and items from places far away, exotic and foreign. The way to do it is to follow the sounds of the wind chimes clinking or bow to the many tall African and Thai statues welcoming you to a new alley. Although there are tags on most of the items, make sure to bargain once you make your way to the cashier.
You often have to bend and watch your head while going through small, beautifully carved wooden doors, which take you from one section of the warehouse to the next, opening the way to more tight alleyways, surrounded by tall shelves full of dusty and eclectic items and lit by hundreds of dim lamps and lanterns — if lit at all. Don't hesitate to take a step in the dark areas because that's where you might find the most quirky items, such as large and colourful masks, funny little frog statues, animal horns and ostrich eggs, to name a few.
In the neater and brighter areas of the warehouse, rows of perfume bottles are displayed on glass shelves along with a wide collection of crystal glass shishas from various countries. There's also a custom-made frames section with 14 styles — Spanish, Italian, Indian, Moroccan, Arabic, etc.
Although this isn't the place to shop if you're an avid collector of antiques, be sure to see the "secret" antiques corner, which contains yet more goodies.
Starting small
Fakih, 39, from south India, started a small gift shop in Karama in 1994 and since then, has established a vast souvenir and handicrafts company that employs artisans in remote areas around the world and distributes goods to Europe, India and China. He was keen to show me a life-size horse made in Cambodia by elderly women over two years without the use of a machine, using washed-off pieces of wood placed on a large, wooden body. While many of the products are handmade, the warehouse contains lots of mass-produced items as well.
Don't expect to come in and out of the Antique Museum quickly. You will go in and come out dusty much later, with more items in your bag than you really need for your house.
Locate the Antique Museum
It's somewhere in the Al Quoz industrial area, behind Times Square Centre.
To get a better chance of finding the place, call 04-347 9935 or visit www.fakihcollections.com
Because the Antique Museum is meant to be kept secret, the management requests that you call prior to visiting. Fakih N.P., the managing director of Fakih Group, which owns the Antique Museum, said the warehouse is not designed to welcome a lot of visitors at the same time.
Opening hours: Sunday-Thursday from 9.30am-8.30pm; Friday from 9-11.30am and 3.30-8.30pm.
Items for sale at the museum
- Ostrich eggs
- Animal horns
- Goat-hair pashmina
- Large wooden Vietnamese elephants covered with fish bone
- Sailor compasses
- Hand-painted-shirts
- Turkish weapons
- Moroccan tagine pottery
- African masks
