Most Dubai apartments hand you the same rooms. The hallway is a strip of tile beside the front door, and the kitchen counter doubles as every other surface in the flat. The bathroom comes with its fittings and nothing else. The furniture is often the landlord's. What you actually get to choose is the small stuff.
That small stuff is where a home gets its personality, and the pieces that do the most work are the ones you touch every day. A kitchen roll holder. The thing your keys land in. The runner on the table you eat at. This guide goes room by room and picks the accessories that earn their place in each one.
What are home accessories?
Home accessories are the movable objects in a room that are not furniture: holders, racks, runners, bowls, frames, candle holders, planters, figurines. They are what you add after the sofa and the bed are in, and what you take with you when the lease ends.
They split into two kinds. The first kind does a job. A toilet paper holder holds toilet paper, and a runner keeps the table clean under the serving dishes. The second kind is there to be looked at: a rabbit figurine, an angel sculpture. Both matter. The working kind is the better place to start, because a room already has to contain those objects anyway, and choosing a good one costs nothing in space.
In this store the working pieces are mostly iron in antique gold, copper, black, brown or verdigris green, with ceramic, wood and cotton textiles for the softer jobs, and stone or stone-effect pots for the balcony. The Home Accents collection is where most of the holders, runners and bowls below live.
How do you use accessories to decorate a room?
Start with the object the room already needs and choose it for its looks. Then add one piece that has no job at all. That is the whole method, and it changes shape from room to room because every room needs something different.
A kitchen needs a roll holder and somewhere for the cutlery. A bathroom needs a toilet paper holder, and a hallway needs a landing spot for keys and post. The bedroom is the exception. It needs very little, which is exactly why one good object stands out there. Out on the balcony it is pots, and something that looks like it belongs beside them.
Get those right in a finish you like and the room already has a direction. The ornaments then have something to agree with instead of doing all the work alone.
Room by room: what carries the personality where
Hallway
In an apartment the hallway is often a meter of wall between the door and the living room. Go vertical. The Rustic Vintage Wall Storage Rack (AED 395) sits at eye height and takes post, keys, sunglasses and the parking card, and because it is on the wall the shoe pile underneath stays a shoe pile instead of turning into a shelf. If you cannot drill, the Country Style Magazine/Post Holder (AED 245) does the sorting job from the top of a shoe cabinet.
One frame changes the strip of wall from corridor to entrance. The Antique Gold Leopard Picture Frame (AED 89) is warm enough in tone to read well under a hallway downlight, which in many Dubai apartments is the only light there is.
A villa gets a real entrance hall and usually an outside one too. The Rustic French Cottage Wall Mailbox (AED 265) goes on the gate pillar or beside the front door, and it is the first accessory any visitor sees. Inside, the Farmhouse White Wooden Wall Shelf (AED 565) carries the same job as the apartment rack with more room to breathe. The Rustic Chateau Lion Statue (AED 645) belongs on the front step.
Kitchen
Counter space in a Dubai apartment is short, so anything that lives on it has to work. Two pieces cover most of the job. The Vintage Iron Countertop Kitchen Roll Holder (AED 225) stands where the roll would have rolled around anyway. The Vintage Farmhouse Iron Cutlery Holder (AED 89) takes the serving spoons and tongs out of the drawer, which frees the drawer and puts a bit of iron next to the hob. It is the cheapest way to change how a kitchen looks.
The dining table is the other kitchen surface, and cotton is what it wants. The Botanical Floral Cotton Table Runner (AED 145) and the Beige Cotton Lemon Table Runner (AED 145) are the same price and pull in different directions. One is floral botanical. The other is beige with lemons on it, and sits better in a kitchen that is already busy. Which brings up the light. A west-facing dining window in Dubai bleaches fabric in a season. Fold the runner away in the afternoon, or bring out the Classic Garden Botanical Tablecloth (AED 215) for meals and keep it in a drawer the rest of the day.
On the open shelf, if you have one, the Blue Floral Ceramic Teapot with Rattan Handle (AED 145) is the piece that has no job and does the most. A pet corner is a kitchen accessory too. The Rustic Dog & Cat Feeding Bowl (AED 185) or the French Country Grey Wooden Double Pet Bowl Stand (AED 195) turns the least loved square meter in the flat into one that matches the rest.
Bathroom
The bathroom has the fewest objects, so each one gets stared at. The toilet paper holder is, honestly, the whole personality of the room. The Iron Heart Toilet Paper Holder Stand (AED 195) stands on the floor and needs no drilling, which in a rental matters. The Compact Brown Iron Toilet Paper Holder (AED 165) is the one for a narrow guest bathroom.
Two practical notes. Keep any iron piece out of the shower's splash line and wipe it when you wipe the tiles; the air conditioning keeps a Dubai bathroom drier than one anywhere humid, so steam is the only thing to manage. And this is the room where a candle holder gets used. The Classic Heritage Angel Candle Holder (AED 165) on the vanity, lit for an evening bath, does more here than it would on a bedroom dresser.
In a villa, the guest bathroom is the one to spend on. Guests see it. The family bathroom, nobody visits.
Bedroom
The bedroom runs the air conditioning hardest and longest, and the air is dry as a result. Iron and ceramic do not notice, and the room does not want much anyway. Two objects at the bedside are enough: the Antique Gold Iron Leaf Candle Holder (AED 245) and a frame with a real photo in it, the Antique Gold Leopard Picture Frame (AED 89) if it did not go in the hall.
Tile or marble is the usual floor in a Dubai bedroom. Cold underfoot at six in the morning, with the AC still running. The Vintage Botanical Rose Cotton Rug with Tassels beside the bed is the accessory you will notice most and see least. Keep it out of the direct line of a sunlit window if the blackout curtains stay open in the day.
One figurine on the dresser, the Vintage Farmhouse Rabbit Figurine (AED 135), is the no-job piece here. One. A dresser with five objects on it is a shelf.
Balcony
The balcony is where materials get sorted honestly. Cotton fades and collects dust, and cheap plastic goes brittle after a summer or two. Stone and iron sit there through all of it and do not care. The Grey Stone Swan Planter/Flower Pot (AED 145) and the Classic Heritage Ionic Column Stone Plant Pot (AED 165) are the stone pieces. Start there.
Get pots off the floor tiles in summer. Tiles on a south or west balcony hold heat into the evening, and roots cook. The Vintage Botanical Iron Plant Stand (AED 220) does that job, and the French Country Verdigris Iron Planter Stand (AED 425) does it in the green that looks right against a white balcony wall. The Rustic Decorative Watering Can (AED 275) is the balcony's version of the hallway rack: the object that looks like it belongs to the work of the place.
From June to September a Dubai balcony is a view, not a room. Choose accents that look right through the glass from the sofa: the Vintage Blue Iron Bird Tray (AED 145) with water or a few pebbles in it, a pot with something that survives the heat. Everything else in the Garden & Outdoor collection follows the same rule.
How many accessories is too many in a room?
If you have to move something to use the surface, the surface has one accessory too many. That is the test, and it is why working pieces are cheaper on space than ornaments: the kitchen roll was going to be on the counter anyway.
Dust is the second test. Dubai dust settles on every horizontal object between cleanings, and ornate iron takes longer to wipe than smooth ceramic. Every extra piece is another thing to lift on Friday. A fair rule for a small room is one object that does a job and one that does not, per surface, and nothing on the floor except a rug or a plant stand.
Bigger rooms in a villa can take more, but the same test applies to each surface. A console with a post holder, a frame and a ceramic jar like the French Country Distressed Ceramic Finial Jar (AED 495) is finished. Add a fourth thing and you are back to moving objects to set down a bag.
What home accessories should everyone have?
The ones that replace an object you already own with a version you actually like. A kitchen roll holder, because the roll is on the counter regardless. A toilet paper holder. The fitted one came with the flat. Something by the door that takes keys and post, or the counter ends up doing it. A runner or cloth for the table you eat at.
Four pieces, one job each. In the pieces named above they run from AED 145 for a runner to AED 245 for the post holder. After those, one candle holder and one frame. Everything else is a want, and wants are more fun to buy slowly.
The home accessories page lists what is in stock by type, and if the no-job piece you are after is a vase, the vase styling guide covers that on its own.
FAQ
Do iron accessories cope with a Dubai bathroom? Yes. The room is air conditioned and dry for most of the day, and the shower is the only wet moment in it. A holder that stands away from the splash line and gets a wipe with the tiles is fine.
Can a cotton runner live on the balcony table? No. Sun bleaches it and dust settles into the weave fast. Textiles stay inside; stone and iron go out.
What changes a rental the most without drilling? The counter and the table. A cutlery holder at AED 89, a kitchen roll holder at AED 225 and a runner at AED 145 need no screws, and a floor-standing toilet paper holder at AED 195 covers the bathroom the same way.
Do you deliver outside Dubai? Yes, anywhere in the UAE, and delivery is free. The store does not ship outside the UAE.
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