CID, ID & DME | Havelock One in Abu Dhabi, Bahrain expansion despite ‘challenges’

Interior manufacturing and contracting firm Havelock One, which last month rebranded from Havelock AHI across its core markets, has designed and built a new office in Sky Tower, Al Reem Island, Abu Dhabi. The company has steadily grown for more than two decades since it was set up as a joint venture in Bahrain in 1998, and is now a prominent player in the industry, with seven offices in five countries.

Havelock One’s new office in Abu Dhabi is equipped with bespoke furniture and strikes the right balance between exuding industrial charm and acting as a friendly space to promote collaboration and creativity.
“Being equally a prime reference for the quality of our turnkey fit-out service offering, while fusing our values and aspirations, the design reflects unity, transparency and, at the same time, facilitates collaboration: glass, timber, leather, steel and carpet are dominant elements in the open-plan layout,” Havelock One’s division director of UAE operations, Adrian Sellar, says.

The new office spans 340m² and Sellar says the bespoke furniture includes “executive desks, workstations, credenzas, and reclaimed timber planters”. These objects create that balance between “a modern industrial charm and a friendly space” for employees, he notes.

“We want to be accessible and welcoming, offering more than a mere office but a space to collaborate with our partners – be it clients, sub-contractors, or suppliers,” Sellar shares. “You can already perceive this attitude in our reception area. The steel and timber reception desk, along with a hardwood back wall feature and slatted timber ceiling, leaves an impression of solidity and quality.”

Havelock One believes it outgrew its old office. This is partly due to a significant increase in the volume of work, including contracts for the government, which necessitated a move away from its previous space in Abu Dhabi’s Tourist Club area. Head of projects in the UAE, William Gorman, says the company felt the old site was not “a true reflection of Havelock One’s quality”.

The new office and corporate branding aims to address this. An updated name and identity reflects and reinforces Havelock One’s core values of precision, foresight, and drive. These attributes have been strengthened with the addition of the word ‘one’ in the company’s new name. The word was chosen to reflect that Havelock One, which operators in GCC markets such as Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE, is a single entity. While it works across different geographic areas and time zones, exporting bespoke fittings to other regions, and supplying global brands, it is an integrated outfit. It claims to have one standard of excellence, which does not change across sectors, trades, or marketplaces.

In conjunction with the new office in Abu Dhabi and a change in corporate branding, Havelock One is building a second factory in Askar, Bahrain, that will eventually double its capacity for making bespoke joinery, metal items, and upholstery.

While expansion may come at time when Havelock One’s group managing director, Kashif Akhtar, admits “the market is quite challenging at the moment, Havelock One continues to go up a gear.

The business is driving forward with a new office in Abu Dhabi, its second factory in Bahrain, and Akhtar believes this growth is thanks to the trust the company has from its clients.

“There is always a case for quality and commitment. We are quite proud that our stakeholders trust us and our integrity – and keep on coming back with more business opportunities.”

Read the article: https://www.commercialinteriordesign.com/insight/43635-havelock-one-is-building-a-factory-in-bahrain-that-will-double-its-capacity

Read the article: https://identity.ae/re-introducing-havelock-one/

Read the article: https://design-middleeast.com/havelock-ahi-rebrands-to-havelock-one/

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