Note: Most vendor photos lead to the vendor's website/FBpage/Instagram.
SO MANY MARKETS.
So we went to check out the Bab Market's opening day at Bab Al Bahrain. I was really excited. So excited, we showed up at 4, when it started.
So the Bab Market is the Ministry of Culture's way of celebrating the Manama: Capital of Arab Tourism 2013 program by having an outdoorsy shopping festival with local vendors, not unlike Market 338 and in some ways the Basta Market which started last weekend.
At first glance, our initial thought was that Bab Al Bahrain is such a bad location for an outdoor shopping thingi, because of the traffic congestion that Bab Al Bahrain is so famous for. [NOTE: They do offer free shuttles from Aali Mall to Bab Al Bahrain to avoid traffic congestion.] Once we got in, though, it felt really like the perfect area for a real marketplace. It had a marketplace feel. It was marketplacey.
The vendors present for Bab Market's first weekend (Feb. 28 - Mar. 2) are:
Arab Youth Climate Movement (In the official schedule their name was Citizen Scientist)
A fairly new organization in Bahrain, their aim is to spread awareness and emphasize the importance of climate change. They didn't print any brochures because they wanted to be environmentally-friendly (duh), and they were giving away little pots of flowers to those who filled out their really short survey on the iPad on display. They also had a nice slideshow about the things they have done so far.
Stationary Seventy Seven
This little piece of colorful heaven is a newly opened stationary in Riffa run by a wonderful Bahraini couple who have both majored in design. The store is technically run by the wife, but she has a wonderfully supportive husband so YAY FOR THEM.
That print of a typewriter at the bottom of the picture? Mine now.
It's technically a regular stationary but they offer funky stuff and they make you want to live in a stationary forever. Their prices are fine, considering I bought the above print for BD20.
Many of their items are from New York , clearly since they had a few notebooks officially from the Museum of Modern Art.
They have lots of knickknacks like funky alarm clocks, colorful artsy pencils, weird sharpeners, bags, toys, and notebooks.
Also, their logo is a little elephant called Feelo so...
Achaar In A Jar
Pretty self-explanatory. They offered a tomato-flavored achaar, vegetable, and lemon. Each for about BD2-3.
I bought two for my achaary family. So... we'll find out tomorrow if it's good achaar.
[UPDATE: It's good achaar. It's not "wow" achaar, and the tomato-flavored one is too acidic, but it's decent.]
Alia's Textile
A fashiony stall with different types of items, it looked like they had things for kids.
Babushka
Funky furniture on display. I really like these designs, actually.
GDB Photography
This stall displayed wedding-themed and baby photography prints by Gulsah Baklu. I didn't get a chance to talk to the owners but the photos were beautiful.
Zine Stall
This stall is based on a workshop that the Ministry of Culture hosted about publishing zines, which are (as explained to us) very short publications usually printed in black and white and sold for very cheap, because the aim is to spread personal creativity. The zines displayed are the ones that participants in the workshop had submitted.
Still, the zines were sold for BD2, which is not cheap at all considering you could buy a proper magazine for BD2 (and even BD1). These were printed on regular A4 printing paper and folded. I thought they would cost 500fils be cheaper. Oh well.
[UPDATE: I have been told that the zines are actually sold for BD1, which is a fair price I would have gladly paid. The person at the stand must have accidentally said BD2.]
MC Accessories
This vendor is a graphic designer who was displaying a few artsy coasters. They're pretty and some are in Arabic, and cost BD3 each.
Images D'Orient
This vendor also sells many different coasters, alongside other designed items such as mugs, placemats, trays, etc., all of which were imported from Lebanon.
Nadooi Creations
This vendor is a designer of funky Arab-inspired (and other-inspired) t-shirts, funky notebooks, and even some really nice cards to buy people for their birthdays, or really if you just want to be nice. I think the cards and notebooks are cool!
A Brush To Your Scent
This vendor sells homemade perfume made with some really natural scent bases such as green rose, which is apparently the smell of a rose before it actually blossoms. Very unique, and the designer (perfumer?) is very passionate about what she does, and says all her scents are inspired by her childhood memories. She even has a "dessert rose" scent, Bahraini-inspired.
She also sells bags of fresh scents that are eco-friendly and more practical than buying someone a bouquet of flowers.
She actually has a workshop coming up for Bab Market on March 15 & March 16 on Perfume Heritage where she teaches the art of perfume-making. I signed up because I get to make my own perfume so that sounds pretty cool.
FYI Wall Arts (Misspelled in the official list as FWI)
This graphic designer is focused on taking existing images/art and jazzing them up into eclectic prints, photographs, or T-Shirts. She had many many samples of her work on display.
ALSO she created a beautiful piece of art by translating quotes from "The Prophet" by Gibran Khalil Gibran to English using a special font she designed using Arabic calligraphy. It messed with my head for a couple of minutes before I realized.
Sharabi Sisters
These sisters are two amazing artists that have had their works featured on the "If Walls Could Talk" art gallery (also displayed at the Bab Market this weekend), and they have translated their artistic styles into different pieces of art and t-shirts.
Tins + Jars
This is actually a newly established brand that is debuting at the Bab Market. They displayed jars of many types of homemade goodies such as cookies (which looked delicious), mehyawa breadsticks (they were soft, though, and I usually picture breadsticks to be crunchy bread), and margoog, among other things. The owners are very friendly and actually offer samples of every one of their products. The cookie I sampled was as delicious as I thought it would be (chewy) and the mehwaya breadsticks were good.
Joelle Boujacli
A boutique filled with different types of jewelry and accessories. I did appreciate that she brought in a huge mirror for the people who were trying on the accessories. It's a nice gesture. It's nice.
Baytooti
This stand boasted homemade burgers and salads. It all looked delicious and I'm sad I couldn't try any.
Bossy Kitchen
The famous home-chef known for her brookies and homemade healthy take on great meals like pasta and different salads. She also offered different homemade juices and tea, and she was her usually cheery self, of course.
Tuga Bakery
ERMEGERD!
This baker displayed a unique set of baked goods, because they are all Portugese-inspired desserts. I've never had Portugese pastries. I've never even thought of Portugese pastries.
She gave me a sample of the Pastel De Nata and it was absolutely delicious. I WAS SO SURPRISED BECAUSE I'M SO CAKEY.
It was good. I like her.
Popuccino
This store sells flavored gourmet popcorn. They had on display a huge bucket of mixed popcorn, including blueberries, strawberries, etc. Apparently the actual store is somewhere in Hidd.
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All in all it was a good variety of vendors.
Also, a musical area was set up so that the musical artist of the day would play their soundtrack to the market. The first day had Octet.
The guitarists were good, and played songs that I think were appropriate for the market, but now I forget exactly which songs they played. Oh well.
Inside Bab Al Bahrain was set up for the pop-up art galleries, which, this week, featured the "If Walls Could Talk" art exhibit, one of our personal favorites that had been in display in Bahrain Financial Harbour. You could just walk in and take a look at the cool art.
Also, there were many designated workshop areas, which seem to be organized well without looking clumpy.
The thing that we think makes Bab Al Market the perfect place for a local designers' market, despite the traffic congestion, is that the set up market overlaps with the pre-existing market, so there are much more things to explore than simply the vendors listed for the weekend. It's great for the businesses that are already set up there, and it also creates a flow for visitors, who will probably discover new things about the area that they hadn't seen before.
Cons:
Even though we thought the market was pretty nice, it was far from perfect.
Personally, we thought that the space for the market could have been utilized better, there were a lot of empty spaces as you're walking from one stand to another sometimes. A few stands actually seemed so far away from the rest of the stands that you wouldn't be sure if they were part of the market.
Also, officially the market was supposed to start at 4:00, but by 5:00, most of the vendors were barely done setting up their stalls. It makes sense though because Thursdays are work days, and a lot of these sellers probably had to rush in from work, but in that case, the officials should have delayed the opening of the market an hour or two, and should have taken all of this into consideration.
Finally, the one thing that we thought made the Bab Market stand out from others like it is the fact that they had volunteers whose jobs were simply to help anyone who needed it. The problem, however, was that most of them were grouped together socializing, so they weren't really spread out and you would have clumps of volunteers on either end of the market. Also, it's kind of intimidating to approach a big group of people.
Top 3 vendors:
It was really difficult to only choose three, because we honestly fell for a lot of these vendors.
In no particular order, we thought these three stalls really made the trip worth it:
A Brush To Your Scent
Because the owner is so passionate about the perfumes, and makes the extra effort to explain the story behind each scent and create funky products (the eco-friendly bouquets). I look forward to her workshop.
Tuga Bakery
Because, really, have you ever even given any thought to Portugese pastries? They were delicious and the owner is a delight. The store is in Amwaj by Costa (or was it Starbucks? Sigh...). I'd definitely visit again, and a box of those miniature sweets would be great to take to a party.
FYI Wall Arts
Because jazzing up old photos of your grandpa is something I never considered.
All-in-all it was a great start, and we personally preferred it over Al-Basta last weekend. Maybe Al-Basta is improving though, so we'll have to see.
Note: Most vendor photos link to the vendor's website/FBpage/Instagram