🇦🇪 Ghent to Dubai: Barbers, Heat and Hospitality
Stijn De Sutter didn’t go to Dubai for the shopping malls or the rooftop pools.
He went to see what the barbershops looked like in a part of the world where men still treat grooming like a ritual, not an afterthought.
Dubai hits you before you even leave the airport.
Heat that wraps around you, glass towers that look like they were drawn by a kid with an unlimited budget, and a city that feels halfway between a sci-fi movie and an old trading port that never stopped moving.
Somewhere in all that steel and glass, the barbershops live.
You find them tucked between cafés, hidden in side streets, or shining like jewelry under bright neon signs. Inside, they are a mix of classic Middle Eastern barbershop culture and modern luxury: mirrors from wall to wall, heavy chairs that look like they’ve seen things, and men sitting quietly, waiting their turn while someone’s beard gets shaped to the millimeter.
In Dubai, a barbershop is not just a place to “get a quick cut”.
It is where you go to slow down.
Hot towels, precise fades, straight lines on beards, threading, eyebrows cleaned up, cologne sprayed generously at the end. Oud in the air. Tea or coffee while you wait. The whole thing walks that fine line between everyday routine and small ceremony.
Stijn watched, asked questions, listened.
The languages changed from chair to chair – Arabic, English, Hindi, Farsi – but the choreography was familiar: barber’s hand on the head, comb, clipper, razor, silence, then laughter. The same dance you see in Ghent, in Italy, in Mexico, just set against a skyline of impossible buildings and desert light.
The Middle East doesn’t treat male grooming as vanity.
It treats it as respect. For yourself, for the people you meet, for the day you’re about to walk into. Beards are shaped, not ignored. Hair is styled, not left to “whatever”. You feel it in the way clients sit a little straighter when the cape goes on.
Everywhere he went, the welcome was the same: warm, open, almost disarming.
Owners curious about Belgium, about ROMAIN, about the old barbershop in Ghent. Stories traded over tiny cups of strong coffee. Techniques compared, tools admired. Dubai may be loud outside, but behind the barbershop door there is a different rhythm – slower, softer, more human.
The city itself is spectacular in that almost obscene way: highways curling like metal snakes, skyscrapers stabbing the sky, mosques catching the sunlight, and somewhere between all that, a small door with a barber pole spinning lazily in the heat. Stijn moved between those worlds: from air-conditioned marble lobbies to narrow, street-level shops where the razor still matters more than the wallpaper.
He left Dubai with what he came for: a better sense of how barbers in the Middle East work, how they mix tradition with modern demands, and how seriously they take service and hospitality.
Warm, beautiful, spectacular on the outside.
But what stays with you is the inside: the chair, the razor, the quiet focus of a barber working inches from someone’s throat, and the feeling that in this part of the world, a man’s visit to the barbershop still means something.
Want to join the Scapicchio Academy at ROMAIN in Ghent, belgium?
Get in touch to plan your 1-on-1 training with Master barber Stijn De Sutter and take your straight razor, honing and shaving services to the next level. Send us a Email
Ready for the real thing?
If you want more than just a good story and you’re ready to sharpen your craft (or your own look), you know where to find us.
From straight razor training and honing on natural stone to classic shaves and serious beard work in the chair, ROMAIN Barbershop & Academy in Ghent is where it actually happens—no noise, no shortcuts.
Book a service in ROMAIN
https://booking.optios.net/6064/select-location
Follow the journey
ROMAIN on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/romain_ghent
Stijn on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/desutter_stijn
Stijn on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@desutter_stijn
Academy info, courses or questions
Email: info@romainghent.be and we’ll take it from there.
Website ROMAIN: http://www.romainghent.be
Website Scapicchio Academy: http://www.scapicchioacademy.com
