“Art is dominant everywhere” – an apt observation made by Riccardo Robustini, cofounder and director of Dubai and Italy-based Unica Architects, who was faced with the high-stakes task of designing the home of Elie Khouri. With such an extraordinary array of art to display, the rest of the interiors would need to be toned down yet elevated to a level that would match the masterpieces hung on the walls, which celebrate aesthetics as much as they do deeper meanings. Evoking ideas of fragmentation of identity, a Rashid Johnson piece from his Broken Men series presents a figure crafted from a collage of ceramic tiles, oyster shells, black soap and red oak. Meanwhile, Revisiting, a Joan Semmel painting, disrupts conventional notions of the male gaze by presenting an alternative view of the female body.
A collector and patron of contemporary art, Khouri is the founder of Vivium – a single-family office that manages a curated portfolio of investments across real estate, hospitality, design, ventures and collectibles, and acquired Spain Sotheby’s International Realty in 2023. He is also chairman of Omnicom Media Group MENA, a judge on Shark Tank Dubai and a board member of numerous committees of global museums. His home in Bvlgari Residences, Jumeirah Bay, is like an extension of one of these museums, bursting with sublime artwork amid a space created with architectural brilliance.
Khouri recruited Robustini to take on the design, and according to the architect, two key criteria – revolving around art of course – steered his direction. “From a physical and aesthetic view, there was a requirement to maximise the walls,” he explains. To achieve this, Robustini set out to craft interiors that felt toned-down in terms of materials and hues. Beige, light brown and white were the shades of choice, immediately offset by the conversation-starting artwork on display around the home. “The design is the skeleton of the space; art comes to add life and colour to it,” explains Khouri.
Overall, designing the property took around eight months, and construction, about a year. Attention to detail is palpably pivotal throughout the home, but the space isn’t wholly minimalist – it’s teeming with colour and character. Beneath the magnificent staircase, for instance, sits a trio of striped stools that would look just as at home in a candy shop. For all the sophistication, clean lines and spotless surfaces, there is a childlike exuberance to Khouri’s home.
The cover of a tome on André Butzer features the German painter’s distinctive cartoonish expressionism in peppy hues of teal and yellow. Nearby, a wicker table by Charlotte Perriand for Cassina furniture takes a circular shape, sectioned like pie slices. An amalgamation of vibrant books is stacked atop this unique piece – 1000 Vases edited by Pier Paolo Pitacco, Art Escapes edited by Grace Banks and A Man and His Watch by Matt Hranek, to name just a few.
Khouri’s Niko Koronis dining table is also topped with books: recent releases that have just been freshly unboxed. Rainbow Spirals – the 1972 oil on canvas by Samia Halaby – is the artwork that stars on the cover of Artists of the Middle East: 1900 to Now by Saeb Eigner, which sits near Paris by Paris, an Assouline hardback in bubblegum pink that explores the French capital through each era. Behind the table, Neighborhood Pool by New York artist Katherine Bradford adds another vivid splash of pigments to the dining room.
