A miniature model of the British royal family's coronation coach, created as a gift for the late Queen Elizabeth II by her close friend Sultan Qaboos bin Said, will become part of King Charles III's private collection.
The real coach was seen by millions on Saturday when it was used by King Charles in his coronation.
But in 2012, to mark the queen's diamond jubilee, the late Sultan of Oman commissioned a bespoke model of the coach as a gift.
He wanted to present her with something that related to her life: specifically, to the most precious and historic moment in her life when she rode the coronation coach to ascend the British throne as queen.
Hermitage Bespoke was responsible with designing the gift, which took a year and a half to build.
It features silver gold, lapis lazuli and precious stones, and was hand crafted and meticulously carved by master artists and jewellers.
“The British royal family is the pinnacle of royalty in Europe," Rachele Benvenuti, executive director of Hermitage Bespoke, said.
"The gold state coach once again featured in a key historic event, making it an even more iconic object.
“At Hermitage, we are proud of the work done on the model: it is a bespoke object that will be handed down for generations."
For more than a year, Hermitage Bespoke master craftsmen reproduced every single detail of the coach from more than 1,000 photos of the carriage taken by the team at the Royal Mews in London to create an exact replica.
Now, the model, which weighs 25kg and is 80cm long and 40cm tall, will be part of the sovereign’s private collection.
It is not the first time Hermitage Bespoke has been approached to create gifts for the royal family.
On the occasion of a visit by the late queen to Oman, the Sultan gave her a Fabergé-style egg composed of lapis lazuli, gold and diamonds, which, through a complex system of internal mechanisms, opens to reveal a horse.
The firm said the piece was "a profound symbology that reveals the great attention paid by the Sultan to one of the queen's greatest passions, horses."
For the wedding of the Prince and Princess of Wales, Hermitage Bespoke was commissioned to create a precious music box.
Several of Hermitage's creations have been exhibited in the Harrods VIP room and at the National Museum of Oman.
“For decades, Hermitage has had the privilege of serving royals and nobles from East Asia to the Middle East, from India to Europe and North Africa," Ms Benvenuti said.
"We are proud and honoured to be serving an admirable set of clients, which speaks for our outstanding and unparalleled capability in the bespoke industry.”
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Etihad Airways flies from Abu Dhabi to Kuala Lumpur, from about Dh3,600. Air Asia currently flies from Kuala Lumpur to Terengganu, with Berjaya Hotels & Resorts planning to launch direct chartered flights to Redang Island in the near future. Rooms at The Taaras Beach and Spa Resort start from 680RM (Dh597).
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Trump has so far secured 295 Electoral College votes, according to the Associated Press, exceeding the 270 needed to win. Only Nevada and Arizona remain to be called, and both swing states are leaning Republican. Trump swept all five remaining swing states, North Carolina, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, sealing his path to victory and giving him a strong mandate.
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Started: November 2017
Founders: Mounir Nakhla, Ahmed Mohsen and Mohamed Aboulnaga
Based: Cairo, Egypt
Sector: transport and logistics
Size: 150 employees
Investment: approximately $8 million
Investors include: Singapore’s Battery Road Digital Holdings, Egypt’s Algebra Ventures, Uber co-founder and former CTO Oscar Salazar
Company Fact Box
Company name/date started: Abwaab Technologies / September 2019
Founders: Hamdi Tabbaa, co-founder and CEO. Hussein Alsarabi, co-founder and CTO
Based: Amman, Jordan
Sector: Education Technology
Size (employees/revenue): Total team size: 65. Full-time employees: 25. Revenue undisclosed
Stage: early-stage startup
Investors: Adam Tech Ventures, Endure Capital, Equitrust, the World Bank-backed Innovative Startups SMEs Fund, a London investment fund, a number of former and current executives from Uber and Netflix, among others.
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November 23-27 (The Gabba, Brisbane)
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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.”
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The chef's advice
Troy Payne, head chef at Abu Dhabi’s newest healthy eatery Sanderson’s in Al Seef Resort & Spa, says singles need to change their mindset about how they approach the supermarket.
“They feel like they can’t buy one cucumber,” he says. “But I can walk into a shop – I feed two people at home – and I’ll walk into a shop and I buy one cucumber, I’ll buy one onion.”
Mr Payne asks for the sticker to be placed directly on each item, rather than face the temptation of filling one of the two-kilogram capacity plastic bags on offer.
The chef also advises singletons not get too hung up on “organic”, particularly high-priced varieties that have been flown in from far-flung locales. Local produce is often grown sustainably, and far cheaper, he says.
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