While this year’s Eid al-Fitr celebrations will be more low key and in smaller gatherings compared to previous years due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the silver lining is that it will make the festivities more intimate and special. With our apartments and villas — whether rented or owned — having become our safe havens even more so than ever, create a warm, inviting and hospitable home for your Eid guests on Saturday May 23 with a dining room or al fresco tabletop scheme stylishly curated in contemporary trends. Here, we’ve chosen our five favourite tablescape themes for Eid al-Fitr, with considered styling advice and expert tips to create the perfect look at home.

Contemporary Arabesque

There’s no better time to bring beautiful Arabesque items to your home décor and tabletop schemes than during the holy month of Ramadan and the celebratory festival that marks its completion, Eid al-Fitr. New for spring/summer 2020, we love the chic Ramadan Capsule Collection of home and dining accessories from luxury homeware brand Aura, available through Instagram. The Ramadan range includes a chic Shaker collection of coasters, trays, chargers, plates, bowls and napkins in pearl white, beautifully finished with elegant black calligraphic artwork penned by regionally-renowned Saudi-Moroccan calligrapher Shaker Kashgari. His calligraphy speaks of thoughtful, traditional Arabic sayings, such as: ‘Even though our place might be small to accommodate you, our heart isn’t’.

The Shaker collection’s monochrome palette makes it a versatile addition to your Eid house decorations, and we recommend decorating the dining room and table with brass or gold accents as these will pick up the hint of gold in Kashgari’s calligraphic details. 

One of our favourite pieces is the Shaker table runner with fashionable corner tassels that will add a contemporary look to your table while the black calligraphic design creates a central focal point. A snip at just AED129 each, buy two and place one horizontally down a rectangular table, in the classic way, and place the second runner across the first at one end, to create an interesting layer to the table. 

 Ottoman Elements

Arabic calligraphic patterning is an admirable art form of its own, and it’s becoming very fashionable in homes around the world, not just in the Middle East. Silsal Design House, one of the Middle East’s leading homeware brands, has been leading this trend for years, and has a recognisable signature style of colourful Arabesque designs patterning its contemporary homeware and tabletop collections. 

Silsal Design House’s 2020 collection for Ramadan, Kunooz, blends Ottoman calligraphy, East African geometrics and Mesopotamian botanical motifs seamlessly, creating a traditional look for your tabletop while infused with current trends. Kunooz, which means ‘treasure’, has another winning ingredient in order to create a stylish Eid tablescape — finished with a distinct cobalt blue pop, the bold colour draws upon Pantone’s colour for 2020, Classic Blue. 

Samar Habayeb, CEO and creative director of Silsal Design House, offers these expert tips to create a professionally styled table scheme for Eid:

Add depth and drama to your tablescape by layering matching plates for a look that is rich and cohesive. This works well for special occasions and gives your table a purposeful and refined look. For a little pomp and ceremony, add vases, candles, floral arrangements and some beautifully packaged favours that give a nod to the overall style and theme.

Credit: Silsal Design House, styled by Maya Toubia

Blush Crush

With Pantone’s Classic Blue colour trend directing our style cues for the year, from fashion to homeware, all shades of blue across the spectrum are in vogue for 2020. Valentina Piscopo, the founder of KUKY Design an online interior design platform specialising in e-design, suggests pairing softer hues of blue with delicate notes of blush and cashmere for a more relaxed, informal tabletop setting for Eid al-Fitr. She suggests teaming Crate and Barrel’s Helena blush linen napkins with artisanal-style plates in peach from H&M Home and burnished gold cutlery from Zara Home for a laidback-luxe look.   

Valentina says:

When it comes to hosting, I prefer to take a laidback and inviting approach. I use a lot of layering, often choosing table runners instead of tablecloths for a less formal look, and I like to add texture. Blush and cashmere tones are my go-to this season, and I keep plenty of napkins, sculptural vases and mats in these colours which I mix and match. My flatware is gold because it makes any setting feel special. To inject colour, I go for greenery instead of flowers, with palm fronds being at the top of my list, or try eucalyptus and citrus fruits.

Pomegranate Panache

If you prefer to decorate your dinner table for Eid al-Fitr 2020 with a fun and frivolous scheme with pops of inviting, energetic colour, take inspiration from table stylist and wedding planner Maya Toubia. Her eclectic Rainbow Tablescape, showcased on Instagram, presents an arresting display of wonderfully bright pomegranate-shaped plates from East Gallery, against a verdant backdrop of monstera-leaf-shaped placemats from Homes R Us. This is a quirky display full of warmth and vitality that will set the scene for a joyous evening with family and friends. 

In Greek and Persian mythology, pomegranates are a symbol of beauty, life and fertility, and we love the energy from the colourful ceramic plateware range from Dubai-based art curators East Gallery, available online at Boom and Mellow, expertly styled into an exotic, botanical scheme by Maya. 

Staying on the fruity theme, our go-to ornament that effortlessly adds Middle Eastern flavour to any setting is the classic ceramic pomegranate art d’objet by Persian artist Keyvan Fehri, available from O’de Rose in Dubai, which have become a design classic. Buy several so you can cluster them together on a tray as an Eid table centrepiece, scatter amongst the dinnerware and table décor for a less curated look, or place one on each plate for each diner to admire (or as favours, if you’re feeling generous!).  

Above: Available from O’de Rose

Coffee Couture

The Arab world is well-known and loved for its coffee culture, and dallahs — traditional Arabic coffee pots — have a special heritage and history steeping back to bedouin times. Dallahs brew Arabic coffee — known as a qahwa — through a complex multi-stage process, giving it a distinct flavour. For festivals and feasts like Eid al-Fitr, families traditionally serve a variant known as khaleeji, which has a spicier and more bitter taste to it. 

The traditional dallah has a bulbous body that tapers into a ‘waist’ and is topped by a spire-shaped lid, while the coffee pours through a long, skinny spout, perhaps made from antique pewter or heirloom silver. For Eid 2020, serve khaleeji coffee with a more contemporary flavour, with a bold dallah-style thermos that expresses your personality. We love the eclectic thermos range on Saudi homeware site roomoursonline.com, from pink Missoni-style chevrons to exotic Arabesque jungle (yes, it’s a theme!), blue and white maioliche tiles for a look with Mediterranean flavour, or add the pow-factor with a quirky comic book design. 

We hope these trending ideas and insightful styling tips have given you plenty of inspiration to create a fabulous lunch or dinner party for Eid al-Fitr, accessorised with the latest must-have home fashions. For ideas on what to cook for your Eid al-Fitr dinner party, check out these delicious recipe ideas, and share your tablescape creations on Instagram and tag @homeclubme for a repost!