Over the years a previously drab industrial estate in north-west London has become home to an array of Middle Eastern food and beverage businesses, challenging well-known Edgware Road as the centre of Arabic culture in the city.
Park Royal is better known for having an abundance of articulated lorries and grey steel warehouses than places to socialise.
But in the past decade the district has become popular among members of the Arab diaspora.
Dotted along its factory-lined streets are Arab-run lounges, cafes, bakeries and supermarkets that speak to an entrepreneurial shift away from London city centre.
It is a trend captured in Pipe Dreams Zine, a digital and print project that maps the story of Park Royal through interviews and photos of businesses in the area.
The Arts Council England-funded publication was part of this year’s Shubbak Festival, which celebrates contemporary Arab culture.
Nabil Al Kinani, a researcher and writer on the project, moved to the UK from Iraq as a child and has been hanging out in Park Royal since he was a teenager.
The area is cheaper than Edgware Road and caters to a different crowd, he said.
“Park Royal and the businesses here really strive to make the experience of Damascus, Lebanon, Iraq, etc more accessible to the wider community,” Mr Al Kinani told The National in front of Bamboo Lounge, one of his favourite shisha spots.
“So as a young person I would come to Park Royal because I could afford to, whereas Edgware Road is a little bit out of the way."
The presence of Arab businesses in Park Royal is not new.
The district first came on the radar during early waves of Middle Eastern migration into London, particularly to the west of the city, that followed several regional conflicts and the surge of oil money in the 1970s and 1980s.
Sweetland, a bakery specialising in Arabic desserts, opened in Park Royal in 1997 and is one of the oldest businesses on the block.
It was set-up by Lebanese Houssam Haddad, who came to the UK in 1984 at the age of 14 to escape the civil war in his homeland.
More recent conflicts in the region have led to a new crop of commercial enterprises.
Sameh Asami arrived to London in 2016 with his family as part of the UK’s Vulnerable Persons Resettlement Scheme, after fleeing the war in Syria.
Three years ago, he teamed up with two other people to open the Levant Book Cafe in the middle of Park Royal’s warehousing estate.
The beautifully decorated cafe sits alongside car repair garages, dead-end alleys and storage units on the one hand, and Middle Eastern supermarkets and bakeries on the other.
The cafe is a journey to Mr Asami’s home city of Damascus.
“Every Arab here has lost something of his heritage and homeland when he left his country so we wanted this place to be another homeland,” Mr Asami said.
Various handcrafted Syrian wares fill the cafe and he has made painstaking efforts to create an authentic experience.
Jars of fruit preserves, made by women in Syria, sit on a glass counter. On another, traditional Arabic ice cream handmade using a family recipe and covered in pistachios tempts customers.
Shelves hold boxes made from hand-carved wood and mother of pearl, with a large portion of wall space taken up by dozens of Arabic books for customers to borrow and read.
The soothing sound of trickling water emanates from a miniature marble fountain – similar to those found in the courtyards of traditional homes in Damascus – as Arabic music plays in the background.
There is even an olive tree outside, a comforting contrast to the corrugated iron of the surrounding buildings.
Mr Asami said he chose his Park Royal location because it was quiet and offered more space at a cheaper price.
“It also already had an Arab presence with several supermarkets, so we wanted to create something nice to add to that," he said.
He buys a lot of his supplies from nearby Salam Supermarket, which was opened two years ago by another Syrian.
“I know all the places around here and we’re all friends. They’re all hard workers and many of them have already expanded their businesses,” Mr Asami said.
Mr Al Kinani says the Arab uprisings of a decade ago explain the area’s more recent surge in activity.
“We had an influx of people from the Middle East and North Africa coming into London and wider parts of the UK.”
Mr Al Kinani said people yearned for home, increasing the demand for a taste of home.
“The importance of these businesses is very much cemented by the people,” he said.
But buildings and infrastructure also play their part and the area is set for big changes.
Park Royal is at the centre of the UK’s largest regeneration project and two of the city’s new major transport links will meet there.
There are concerns these developments will displace local businesses. Sweetland had to move to another part of Park Royal after a compulsory purchase order was issued.
Mr Al Kinani hopes the development plans do not upend the multicultural community that has been built in the area.
“Buildings are just bricks and mortar, it's people that create the culture," he said.
“So there's a hope and belief that whatever development happens within the area, they cater for the existing organic culture and they make room and space for that rather than replace it with something that isn't as good."
Mr Asami's plans for the future include turning the Levant Book Cafe into a successful brand that “wins over people”.
“This place is a part of my soul. When I walk through the doors I forget that I am in Park Royal or even in England, and feel like I’m back home in Damascus,” he said.
“I go back to my memories, my childhood, to my old house. And I think our customers get the same feeling when they come here.”
RESULTS
5pm: Maiden (PA) Dh80,000 1,400m
Winner: JAP Almahfuz, Fernando Jara (jockey), Irfan Ellahi (trainer).
5.30pm: Handicap (PA) Dh90,000 1,400m
Winner: AF Momtaz, Antonio Fresu, Musabah Al Muhairi.
6pm: Handicap (TB) Dh100,000 1,400m
Winner: Yaalail, Fernando Jara, Ali Rashid Al Raihe.
6.30pm: Abu Dhabi Championship Listed (PA) Dh180,000 1,600m
Winner: Ihtesham, Szczepan Mazur, Ibrahim Al Hadhrami.
7pm: Wathba Stallions Cup Handicap (PA) Dh70,000 1,600m
Winner: Dahess D’Arabie, Fernando Jara, Helal Al Alawi.
7.30pm: Maiden (PA) Dh80,000 2.200m
Winner: Ezz Al Rawasi, Connor Beasley, Helal Al Alawi.
11 cabbie-recommended restaurants and dishes to try in Abu Dhabi
Iqbal Restaurant behind Wendy’s on Hamdan Street for the chicken karahi (Dh14)
Pathemari in Navy Gate for prawn biryani (from Dh12 to Dh35)
Abu Al Nasar near Abu Dhabi Mall, for biryani (from Dh12 to Dh20)
Bonna Annee at Navy Gate for Ethiopian food (the Bonna Annee special costs Dh42 and comes with a mix of six house stews – key wet, minchet abesh, kekel, meser be sega, tibs fir fir and shiro).
Al Habasha in Tanker Mai for Ethiopian food (tibs, a hearty stew with meat, is a popular dish; here it costs Dh36.75 for lamb and beef versions)
Himalayan Restaurant in Mussaffa for Nepalese (the momos and chowmein noodles are best-selling items, and go for between Dh14 and Dh20)
Makalu in Mussaffa for Nepalese (get the chicken curry or chicken fry for Dh11)
Al Shaheen Cafeteria near Guardian Towers for a quick morning bite, especially the egg sandwich in paratha (Dh3.50)
Pinky Food Restaurant in Tanker Mai for tilapia
Tasty Zone for Nepalese-style noodles (Dh15)
Ibrahimi for Pakistani food (a quarter chicken tikka with roti costs Dh16)
The specs
- Engine: 3.9-litre twin-turbo V8
- Power: 640hp
- Torque: 760nm
- On sale: 2026
- Price: Not announced yet
Classification of skills
A worker is categorised as skilled by the MOHRE based on nine levels given in the International Standard Classification of Occupations (ISCO) issued by the International Labour Organisation.
A skilled worker would be someone at a professional level (levels 1 – 5) which includes managers, professionals, technicians and associate professionals, clerical support workers, and service and sales workers.
The worker must also have an attested educational certificate higher than secondary or an equivalent certification, and earn a monthly salary of at least Dh4,000.
THE BIO: Mohammed Ashiq Ali
Proudest achievement: “I came to a new country and started this shop”
Favourite TV programme: the news
Favourite place in Dubai: Al Fahidi. “They started the metro in 2009 and I didn’t take it yet.”
Family: six sons in Dubai and a daughter in Faisalabad
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
