Ca Phin Space - A love letter to Vietnam, from Dubai

When we opened Ca Phin Space, we wanted to do more than create a place to drink Vietnamese coffee.

We wanted to create a little feeling of home. A place where, for a moment, you could step through the door in Dubai and feel like you had been transported back to Vietnam — to the little coffee shops, the familiar stools, the ceramics, the sounds, and all the small details that make Vietnamese coffee culture feel so special to us.

And because we care a little too much about where things come from, we wanted that story to live in every corner.

Look a little closer

Start with the door. The holder is made from a coffee tree branch, transported directly from the farms where our Vietnamese coffee grows in the Central Highlands.

Then take a seat.

Vietnam is famous for its tiny plastic stools — but we wanted more people to be able to enjoy that familiar shape, so we turned the little stool into a bigger table. Made in Vietnam, of course. And if you look around, you'll still find the modernised little stools scattered throughout the space.

Look up, and you'll see another familiar shape. Our lamps are inspired by the phin filter, the humble brewer behind a cup of Vietnamese coffee. The real phin is also available to take home from our shop.

It's our way of taking the everyday things we grew up with and giving them a new place to live.

Vietnam, right down to the details

The story doesn't stop at what you see.

Our ceramics come from a Vietnamese pottery workshop. Our T-shirts and merchandise are made using Vietnamese fabric and craftsmanship. Even the tiles across our bar and the coasters beneath your coffee have a little bit of Vietnam in them — they're made from used coffee grounds collected from cafés around Saigon and given a second life.

None of these things are there just for decoration.

They're little pieces of a culture we love, brought together in one space.

Made with love, the right way

We also knew that if we were going to tell this story, we wanted to tell it properly.

That's why we worked with The Lab Concept, a team deeply familiar with Vietnamese coffee culture. We went back to Vietnam to share our vision and work closely with the team, who then brought that vision to life by travelling to Dubai and sourcing materials that felt true to the space and to Vietnamese culture.

Because authenticity isn't something you can simply decorate a room with. It's in knowing why the stool is shaped that way. Where the coffee tree came from. Why the phin hangs above your head. And who made the cup you're drinking from.

A little piece of home

Ca Phin is our first brick-and-mortar home, but in many ways, it feels like a collection of places from home.

A little farm. A little street-side café. A little pottery workshop. A little corner of Saigon. Put together, they became Ca Phin.

So next time you visit, don't just look around.

Look a little closer.

You might find a little bit of Vietnam waiting for you.