Interior fit-out in Abu Dhabi

An interior fit-out is the work that turns a bare or stripped-back space into a finished, usable one. It covers partitions and ceilings, flooring, joinery, electrics and cooling, painting and finishes, and the furniture that goes in at the end. A fit-out is not the same as a renovation, which changes an interior that already works, and it is not interior design, which produces the drawings a fit-out is built from. Arkan Interiors does both, on one contract.

Where a fit-out goes wrong

A fit-out usually goes wrong in the gaps. The designer hands over to the contractor. The contractor sub-lets the joinery. The person who drew the cabinet never meets the person who builds it, and the detail that made the drawing worth paying for quietly disappears somewhere in between. Then the dates start moving, because everyone on site is waiting for someone who does not report to them.

Arkan Interiors takes the whole thing on one contract. We have worked in Abu Dhabi since 2003 and delivered more than 440 projects in that time, for developers, consultants, and private owners. The drawings, the site work and the furniture all sit with the same team, and the joinery is made in our own workshop by our own people rather than bought in from whoever quoted lowest that month. When a door does not close properly, there is no argument about whose door it is.

What a proper bill of quantities looks like

The document you are given before you sign tells you most of what you need to know about who you are hiring.

A serious BOQ is measured. It lists quantities against rates, names materials by specification rather than by adjective, and says what is excluded as clearly as what is included. “Flooring to ground floor” is not a line item. “Porcelain tile, 600 by 1200, rectified, to ground floor, 148 square metres, including levelling screed and skirting” is one.

The three places a quotation hides trouble are provisional sums, exclusions and prime cost items. A provisional sum is an admission that something has not been priced yet, which is honest when the scope genuinely is not known and convenient when it is. Read the exclusions before the total. And ask what happens to the price when a prime cost allowance is exceeded, because that conversation is much easier before signing.

Approvals and the parts that move the date

Work touching the structure, the facade or the building services generally needs approval before it starts, and in an apartment or a managed community the owners association or developer usually has its own process on top of the municipal one. These run on their own clock. A programme that assumes approval arrives on request is the most common reason a realistic-looking schedule slips.

Mechanical, electrical and plumbing coordination is the other one. Anything routed inside a wall or above a ceiling has to be settled before that wall or ceiling closes. A socket moved after the plaster is a small change; a drainage run moved after the screed is not.

If you are working out a budget, we have written up what interior fit-out actually costs in Abu Dhabi by level of finish, and the questions worth asking before you appoint a contractor. For a villa, the renovation checklist covers approvals and sequencing, which is where most programmes slip.