House of Zain

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Multi-coloured, mismatched cushions jostled for space, a striking reinterpretation of traditional, nomadic-style seating. Bold geometric patterning wove its way from the floor plan onto decorative wall motifs, before taking on the form of an irregularly-shaped mirror-topped table in the centre of the space. Wooden floors worked with gently-glowing light boxes to exude a sense of warmth; and state-of-the art speakers towered overhead.

This was Zain Mustafa’s entry for the first ever Index Contemporary Majlis Competition – and he was convinced that he had got it all wrong. Made almost entirely out of recycled materials, he had aimed to create an honest, fresh, sleek, sustainable interpretation of a highly traditional space.

Mustafa’s majlis was revolutionary in its simplicity, in its sensitivity, and in its ability to retain a sense of authenticity whilst catapulting itself into a contemporary context. And, in spite of Mustafa’s misgivings, it won. More importantly, it acts as a telling example of what Zain Mustafa – and the interior design company he has founded – stand for.

At the age of 39, Karachi-born Mustafa has already enjoyed a career that spans academia, fashion, interiors, art, and web design. A public school education in the UK led to further education at New York’s Parsons School of Design, Boston University and Columbia University. Returning to Pakistan to undertake some research for his PHD, Mustafa fell into the world of fashion design. Much like the contemporary majlis, Mustafa’s designs went back to basics, embracing organic, natural fibres and mueslins, in unbleached whites and ivories.

Five years later, Mustafa returned to New York, finding himself in the midst of the dot-com boom. He started designing websites, exploring the art of transporting people from A to B in a digital space. Until 9/11, when he watched as the Twin Towers fell, and decided that it was time to move on. A stint in Santa Fe saw Mustafa’s focus shift to art, which led to an invitation to take part in the 6th Sharjah International Biennial in 2003. By his own account, that’s when he “fell in love” with Dubai, and he has called the emirate home ever since.

While his main focus now falls predominantly on interiors, Mustafa continues to dabble in a range of design disciplines. Adding a brand new string to his already bursting bow, he was recently selected to present a 16-episode television show for Dubai One. CID caught up with Mustafa to find out more about his colourful career path.

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FEATURED COMMENT I really like your post on House of Zain. I loved the idea that we really need to go back to basic when doing home inte   1 Comments Read more comments »

The design award for the contemporary majlis at Index has definitely got to be the biggest achievement of last year for us. It was great to have been sharing a design platform with people that I have looked up to all these years, like Hirsch Bedner Associates.

We were wondering, financially, where we should go, what direction we should take, whether we should veer back to more residential rather than commercial, whether we should go more into educational programmes or not, and then the Index thing suddenly happened.

When it came down to it, I really thought I had made the worst decision. I was looking at our piece and I remember thinking: This is obviously out of place, I’ve misread the brief, something has gone terribly wrong. We were very shocked when we won.

Tell us about the design of your entry.

What we did – and I think this is one of the reasons that we might still be here – is we were honest.

We were not trying to mimic anything. For whatever it’s worth, our work comes from our hearts. There are a million magazines floating around in our office. We look at what’s out there, but we don’t just open up a magazine and say that’s it, let’s bring it in. I know some people do that and each to their own. I know there’s a market for it. They do variations of what’s trendy.

I think our work, especially the contemporary majlis piece, is extremely unfashionable and untrendy.

I kept saying we need to go back to essentials, make it more basic. I looked at the mathematics of the mashrabiya; it was important to understand the mathematics, the tradition of movement and transition. We looked at how we could make it flexible, and how we could make it green, but still contemporary.

It had to be cool and contemporary, so it had to have a chic-ness to it and a slickness to it. Just because something is traditional, it doesn’t mean that it has to be heavy and clunky.

I also decided that we were going to look at recycled products. I wanted to put something together just from leftovers. So, for example, the fabrics came from a company that we work with. It was just throw-away fabric that would have gone to some charity, but it came to this charity instead! There was a list of people that supported us and that, for me, was also a big achievement. There was a group of people that said we believe in this young team’s movement forward in the design world. I couldn’t have done it without Mohanned Sweid of Depa, for example. I wouldn’t be sitting here having this conversation if it wasn’t for people like him.