Sheik Majed

A young man in his mid thirties, Sheik Majed al Sabah, nephew to the Emir of Kuwait, is impeccably turned out, handsome and well spoken. In April 2002, ‘the prince of fashion’ made headlines when he opened his second store in Kuwait City, with a three-day, $500,000 party. Guests included Stella McCartney, Dominico Del Sole, Carla Fendi and fashion journalists from all over the world.
 
His creation, Villa Moda, is one of the most luxurious shopping emporiums in the world. The store, which lies on the outskirts of Kuwait in front of the seaport, is a large glass box resembling an aquarium. The store contains 'mini boutiques' holding the world’s leading designer brands, including Gucci,
 
Bottega Venetta, Prada, Fendi and Etro. Alongside the clothes there is an art gallery and a Botox bar, while a new spa is set to open this September. The interior is ultra modern with polished concrete flooring, green marble walls and stainless steel pillars, marking the paths between the 'mini boutiques'. The furnishings of the restaurant and bar are by B&B Italia while pieces by Cappellini complete the look.
 
The Villa Moda customer, who is well-travelled, adores shopping and, most importantly, has a high disposable income, finds herself truly spoilt at this shopping  Mecca. Here one can change in plush changing rooms (large enough to accommodate eight people at a time), while one’s partner uses the office facilities; complete with Internet access and a personal assistant. Sales staffs are carefully selected from London, New York and Paris and provide the highest quality of service, while highly skilled on-site tailors are capable of making miraculous adjustments.

Popular ‘de-pack’ parties are regularly held at Villa Moda, where VIP customers are invited to unpack new shipments that arrive from Europe before they hit the rails. Special tea parties are also organized at the homes of loyal clients and their friends to launch new collections. Even closing times can be pushed to midnight in order to accommodate shoppers.

Yet Majed’s success wasn’t overnight. When he first went into business in 1992 he found European designers reluctant to get involved in the Middle East. He laughs ‘I approached European companies and they thought I was going to sell clothes from a tent in the desert’. Pent up frustration at the world’s ignorant perception of his people, led Sheik Majed to strive to improve Kuwait’s image overseas. It seemed inconceivable to Westerners at the time that there could exist women within Arab societies who were fashion conscious and avant-garde.
 
Majed’s aim to get rid of these misconceptions was by no means an easy task. He still recalls having been made to wait one hour at Giorgio Armani headquarters before being told that they weren’t interested in doing business with him. Even today people still ask him if women in his part of the world would be able to wear ‘short skirts’ or ‘sleeveless tops’ which, he states, can be 'incredibly frustrating'. However,
Sheik Majed is dedicated to convincing the West that the Middle East is vast market (800 million people) which, given the right product, will undoubtedly prove to be a very profitable one.

Majed has worked his way from the eighth row to the front row at Paris and Milan fashion shows and has therefore earned the respect of the fickle fashion world. And today Sheik Majed has become the envy of every retailer in the Middle East. Gucci president Domenico
 

De Sole calls him a ‘phenomenon’ whilst British Tatler magazine has hailed him as a ‘fashion icon’ and made him a contributing editor.
 
Tell me a bit about your background.
I was born and raised in Kuwait and I have a Bachelor’s Degree in English literature. I don’t really have any education in fashion, it’s just always been a passion for me.

How did you get into fashion?
It was a matter of frustration at not finding what I wanted in this market. As a young generation we wanted more diverse fashion items which didn’t exist in Kuwait at the time.

It also used to break my heart to see how my people always had to shop abroad, in London and Paris. I felt that all the wealth of the country was going overseas.

What is the history of Villa Moda?
It was immediately after the Gulf War, when I bought an old abandoned warehouse in central Kuwait (previously a TV studio built in the 60s), which then became my headquarters. I started out with a small typewriter and a fax machine, looking up the numbers of designers in the back of fashion magazines. I took whatever brands I could grab, I still had no access to major European designers at that time but I managed to do business with the American brands (i.e. Tods, Donna Karen, Ralph Lauren, Calvin Klein, Michael Kors). I was actually quite blessed, because in '92 to '94 it was the peak of the American designers' popularity.

Why did you decide to open the new Villa Moda?
My turning point was in '97 when Dominico De Sole believed in what I had achieved and we opened the Gucci flagship store together in Kuwait in '98. Things happened quite fast after that. I got into the European brands and by '99 Villa Moda became jammed with so many brands that I needed a bigger space; I had to expand.

What was the concept behind the new store?
When I started building, it was on the basis that I wanted to expand due to lack of space. I had first looked into different shopping malls, different locations, then I came up with the idea to develop my own destination in order not to pay any premium for existing shopping malls; that would have been disastrous, as the rates are extremely high (the rental of the property we have now is $1 per square metre). I wanted to create something special, different than anything else in the world and it was a challenge to get people to understand my vision. I hired a young Italian architect, Pierfrancesco Cravel, and together we came up with the Villa Moda concept.

We gave every designer label it’s own space and identity within a huge four-way glass cube within a structure resembling a glass aquarium. That way each label retains its' identity, while the facade projects the Villa Moda aesthetic on the outside.
 
How would you define Villa Moda, is it a department store, boutique…?
It is a luxury bazaar, not a shopping mall, not a department store. There is no other store in the Middle East like Villa Moda.

You've really put Kuwait on the map in terms of fashion, was that your intention?
I wanted to create something very special, very unique and diverse, but my goal is actually much more long term. I’d not only like to promote fashion, but to promote Kuwait, my country. Our government doesn’t really prioritise tourism in Kuwait, it’s actually not a high priority on their agenda, so why shouldn’t we, the young aggressive businessmen in Kuwait do it ourselves? After all, the more you promote the country, the more you generate business.

Where did Kuwaiti high society women shop before that?
There are lots of local stores, but women mainly shopped abroad.

Do you think Kuwaiti women travel less to do their shopping because of Villa Moda?
Yes, definitely. They can now buy the same product cheaper here.

How many designer brands do you currently stock at Villa Moda?
We have ten existing flagship stores including Prada, Yves Saint Laurent, Marni, Fendi, Gucci, and Ferragamo. We also have a multi-brand section that stocks different designers.

Which new additions are you hoping to bring into Villa Moda?
We are hoping to add Cavalli, Dolce Gabbana and Pucci stores by the end of this year. We are still having difficulties with the French brands, as they are not easy
to do business with. We’re also introducing a Spa in September.

Are you interested in having a department for fine jewellery?
We are actually starting with a Boucheron flagship store sometime next year and we are officially talking to DeBeers.

Where is your favourite place to shop other than Villa Moda?
The old Bazaars in Damascus.

Villa Moda is known for frequent discount sales, sometimes up to 70% reductions, how are you able to sustain that?
We have two sales annually, in July and in January. Within every season we have also have one day where we do a 20% sale to adjust our stock levels. We have an outlet store, which is at the old Villa Moda premises, where we make reductions of up to 70% on old stock; like any other outlet store in the United States or anywhere else in the world.

I don’t like to leave old stock in boxes or ship them back to a central warehouse, like our competitors do. I think it’s insane, why shouldn’t we allow other consumers to buy as well?

Small businesses have been loosing customers and designers to you, how does that make you feel?
When Villa Moda first came to Kuwait, local stores feared that they would probably have to close down. Suppliers and designers having seen the standard of operations at Villa Moda, (which is of an International standard) became dissatisfied with their
existing agents. Every season there are 3 to 4 brands approaching us, wanting to leave their existing retailers in Kuwait.

In a way, I think Villa Moda has affected  competitors positively, in the sense that they have had to update their shops and their selections because they now realise that the only way forward is to raise standards in order to keep up.

You’ve had a big hit with the Prada Kaftan which you commissioned for Villa Moda last year, was the idea of designer Kaftans your own or was it a request from your customers?
During the month of Ramadan women in Kuwait are always wearing Kaftans. They spend a lot of money buying locally made kaftans, which are sometimes really badly made, sometimes beautifully made. I noticed there was no price issue when it came to a really beautiful kaftan and since women love to buy brand names, I thought then why shouldn’t we make a designer kaftan that you can buy along with a matching shoe and bag for example? I approached all the designers with my idea and the first one to accept was Prada.

Will you be commissioning Kaftans from other designers?
We’ve already made kaftans with Missoni, Cavalli, Antonio Maras and Etro. Every year we will commission different designers to make kaftans for us, next week we are launching the Marni kaftan.

We hear you are good friends with Tatler’s fashion editor Isabella Blow, how did that friendship develop?
We first met at the bar of the Ritz hotel in Paris last October, where I was meeting Jonathan Newhouse, chairman of Conde Nast International. Isabella was doing a story about ‘Fashion Icons Meet Manolo Blanik’ at the time and asked me if I would be interested in getting involved in the photo shoot. I told her I definitely wouldn't’t be able to squeeze my feet into a pair of Manolo Blaniks but would try to help out with the shoot. We ended up doing the photo shoot for Tatler in the Ritz hotel.

How did you come up with the Kaftan Society feature in the June 2003 issue?
After doing the Manolo shoot in January, Isabella saw that I had a talent for styling so she asked me if I was interested in being contributing fashion editor. I agreed on condition that I would be given a free hand in doing stories for Tatler. They accepted and so I decided that my first story would be about Kaftans in Kuwait. I directed the
story myself, which involved mixing British blue blood, such as Daphne Guiness, with local blue blood, always wearing Kaftans, using real people and shooting in Kuwait.

The Kaftan photo shoot was very impressive, have you been criticized in Kuwait for doing the feature in Tatler?
Yes I was. But I closed my ears and moved on. The first criticism I had received was about the Manolo shoot, which was  shot in a bedroom  at the Ritz with Grace Jones. My wife received many phone calls about that. Thank god I am blessed with a wife and family who are open minded, we have such a great relationship.

What is your next story for Tatler?
It’s quite challenging, we’re trying to do something in Damascus about the unknown beauty of Syria.

What are your plans for the future?
We are opening Villa Moda in Dubai in September within the Emirate’s Towers shopping mall. The official opening will be in November after Paris fashion week and we’re asking Alexander McQueen to design the opening party for us. We’re also opening in Qatar in January and in March we hope to open in Bombay.

Do you have any aspirations outside the fashion industry? You are a very good unofficial ambassador for Kuwait, would you be interested in a career in politics?
As long as I’m given a freehand and I have enough power and freedom to make decisions, then I would definitely accept a post in politics. But I would also have to be involved in something that I like, such as promoting tourism or the arts. With his elegant stature, perfect manners and sharp eye for everything that is 'in vogue', Sheik Majed will, without question, go down in history as the man who brought haute couture to the Middle East. In a region so rich in colours, textures and florid design, it is surprising that an exodus of fashion like this has taken so long to come about. However, now that the Arabian prince's' dreams have started to come into fruition, there is no telling what will happen in the future; only time can tell...