A Roof, a Crate, a Cup of Coffee | Presentation by Omar Darwish

A presentation by architect, artist and researcher Omar Darwish on how places for food are made, as part of What The Food programme. A Roof, a Crate, a Cup of Coffee How are places for food made? Moving through archival photographs and records of markets, cafés, and restaurants in the UAE during the time of the trucial states, this presentation looks at the structures and everyday decisions behind them: a roof assembled for shade, crates arranged into a stall, and chairs brought outside for coffee. It follows how these spaces are built and adapted by the people who use them, and how selling food or serving a drink can create places to pause, meet, and return to. Through these ordinary details, the talk considers the relationship between food, construction, and gathering. Omar Darwish Bio Omar Darwish is an architect, artist, and researcher based in the UAE. His practice examines the everyday objects, spaces, and systems that shape life in the UAE and their relationship to the wider Arab world. Working across archival research, oral histories, drawing, film, performance, and installation, Darwish explores how architecture and infrastructure carry social histories, political ideas, and forms of authority. Through storytelling and humour, his work traces how familiar objects and environments are designed, circulated, adapted, and experienced over time. Darwish was part of the 12th cohort of the Salama bint Hamdan Emerging Artists Fellowship. He was a winner of Dubai Design Week’s 2025 Urban Commissions, and received the 2024 Abu Dhabi Art Architecture Prize, and is a recipient of the UAE Ministry of Culture’s Modern Heritage Research Grant.