Bahrain’s Ornaté specialises in all things Moroccan: from tadalakt painting to tagines, reports LIZ O’REILLY

Bahrain-based Ornaté, billed as the home of all things Moroccan in the Gulf, has been so successful in recent years that managing director Moncef Megzari is planning expansion with a Jeddah branch set to open before the end of the year.

Ornaté, which specialises in Andalusian décor and accessories, came to Bahrain around seven years ago after Megzari found he was spending a great deal of time in the Gulf servicing clients eager to fit their homes and palaces in the traditional Moroccan style.

He has been in the home décor business for 35 years, following a 600-year family tradition of creating intricate decorative pieces and wall and ceiling finishes using tiling, gypsum, paint and wood carving.

And he personally designs the finishes for each project with all Ornaté’s products being handmade at the family factory near Fez.

Ornaté’s Bahrain showroom features a cornucopia of Moroccan pieces from a traditional tiled majlis area, hanging lanterns, large urns and plant pots, decorative tagines and bathroom accessories and cabinets through to intricate doors, screens, mirrors and even roof tiles.

Megzari has brought traditional craftsmen to Bahrain to work on his projects throughout the Gulf: from finishing walls in the traditional tadalakt paint style to creating magnificent painted or carved wooden ceilings and indoor and outdoor fountains.

And thanks to a secret recipe the family has come up with through years of research, he can offer large-scale intricately-tiled items, which can be shipped and fitted in one piece. Ornaté uses a secret-formula glue, rather than the old-style concrete which would previously have been needed for their construction, making them too heavy to ship or fit in one go.

Megzari says: “This has revolutionised what we are able to do. Whereas previously a fountain, for example, would be so heavy that it would need to be made in several pieces and would take many men to mount on a wall, this special glue means it can be made in one piece and easily fitted which means less work for everybody.”

In the last few years Ornaté has been kept very busy with three years spent designing and overseeing the interior decoration of a magnificent palace in Qatar, where the company also has a showroom, as well as providing interiors for projects from private villas to majlises and hotels.

Now Megzari is looking to take his Moroccan designs further into the Gulf with the opening of the Jeddah branch later this year.

He said: “We have had a very good response throughout the Gulf, it took a while for people to get to know about us but now word is getting out there and more and more people want my designs for their homes, offices and palaces.

“I’m not a trained designer but this is in my blood and our clients are always very satisfied.”