After N.Bar's success, Negin Fattahi-Dasmal's latest venture is JetSet.
Negin Fattahi-Dasmal is visibly stressed out as we meet before the launch of her latest concept.
Between getting her staff to check everything and sorting out the press packs she does occasionally look for reassurance that all will be well.
"I hate starting an interview like this," she says of her stress, as she settles into the chair carefully.
However, her stress is short-lived as the first question is thrown at her.
"Do you find yourself becoming a sort of concept queen in the grooming industry"?
Fattahi-Dasmal smiles and loves it. She has, after all, set up N.Bar, 1847 and now JetSet all under the large umbrella that she heads — The Grooming Company.
"I don't know what you want to call it," she says of the title, "but I do know that I love the whole idea of looking good and grooming and making oneself presentable."
Towards perfection
She is a self-confessed stickler for perfection — towards everything — but more so towards presentation of the self.
"I never step out of the house unless I'm sure that I'm presentable," she says, acknowledging and appreciating the other extreme of women, who just couldn't be bothered about their outward appearance.
"But I don't think it's fair to associate grooming with just looking good. It's also about hygiene, which is what I wanted to bring out through N.Bar," she says.
N.Bar was born out of her own longing for a dedicated space that provided manicures and pedicures.
On her return to the UAE from the United States, she started the concept here, despite much cynical questioning.
"They did think it strange, but I didn't want nails to become an afterthought at the salon."
They're as important as a facial or a wax and the rest is history," she says of her success with N.Bar.
It's this similar attitude of prioritising a woman's needs that prompted her to look into an exclusive place that offered only hair washes and blow dries.
"Instead of waiting in a salon that has so many treatments just for hair — colouring, hair care and more — a woman who wants just a wash and blow dry or simple styling has either to wait or couple it with other things so the trip isn't a waste," she says, insisting that we get our hair done.
For your hair only
That's not the case with Fattahi-Dasmal's JetSet. "You walk in, sit down, get a scalp massage, shampoo, condition and blow-dry. There are even additional features such as curling, styling and treatments, which I call the long haul," she says going back to how JetSet is modelled around a first-class cabin of the aviation industry back in the 1930s.
"It was such a glamourous era and to be a stewardess in that era, was like the ultimate dream of so many women," she says, referring to the concept as a whole.
As an entrepreneur, she's used to the cynicism that occasionally accompanies a new launch or concept, but the 10 branches of N.Bar in 3 years is all she has to point out to stop people from talking.
"What I do is nothing great. It's just taking basic concepts and innovating them into a reinvention. I'm hardly a pioneer. All I do is analyse needs and trends and revisit traditional ideas to make them contemporary," she says.
By this point, Fattahi-Dasmal is comfortable enough to handle my last question.
"Is the enormous pressure on women to look good fair?"
"Oh God," she exclaims, clearly not expecting that and pausing.
"I would say it's fair and unfair. I think it's fair to expect a woman to look her best, but it's unfair to expect a woman to look as good as some other stereotype. There are so many women I know that don't wear any make-up or designer outfits, but they still manage to look great and I really believe that beauty lies in the eye of the beholder."
With both feet in the industry of looking good, Fattahi-Dasmal's observations are credible and worth paying attention to.
"It's all about confidence. If you feel beautiful that is brought out and those women just look unbelievably attractive."
