Cruising along the rather nondescript Bur Dubai end of Al Wasl Road, prepare to be stopped in your tracks by the sight of an incongruously positioned red telephone box. This is the entrance to Burlesque - a smorgasbord of delights for the home and a true destination store. "We have to explain to people that the phone box is the main door to the gallery - it's like the Tardis," jokes the owner, interior designer, Laith Abdul Hadi. Stepping inside, you are greeted by a nexus of Alice in Wonderland-meets-Tim Burton: walls are lined in moss; a sofa confronts you with its huge eyes; a giant Magritte-style apple sits centre stage. If Ikea is anathema to you, Burlesque is the place; it sets out to seduce and surprise. "We offer an encounter with the extraordinary - a walk through a fantastic reality ..." sums up Hadi. Hadi's brainchild is not your typical interiors store. "As an interior designer, I just couldn't find those 'it' pieces that make or complete a space," he explains. Setting up Burlesque was a painstaking process, largely due to Hadi's exacting standards of what he wanted to showcase. "It could have been much quicker had I gone to the usual furniture and home accessories exhibitions in Italy and Paris. I wanted to discover unknown artisans ... and I wanted to stay as far away as possible from the giant companies producing mass-market pieces. I needed the unique, the shocking and the insane." He certainly succeeded. Burlesque is a gold mine of the sublime and surreal. Exotic designs from all over the world are displayed alongside pieces designed and executed by Hadi. Feathered lighting anyone? Stainless steel furniture inspired by the Rococo and tribal tattoos? A girlie commode by Clément et Lise, featuring a portrait of the ultimate girls' girl, Marie Antoinette - or a Smoking Mona Lisa canvas from Hadi's Decadence collection? Check, check and check. His bestseller? "The Mannequin Heads designed by myself and made by an artist in the States. They are true art pieces." So what do the punters make of Burlesque? Do they get it? "Reactions overall have been fantastic ... once people are in they're flabbergasted. Younger locals love it - and expats. Once we had this woman in her late 60s - whom you'd expect would find a place like this quite shocking - she walked out with a hand-embroidered cushion which says 'Prozac' on it, saying she wants to give it to her husband," says Hadi. "It's these little things that make my day." After studying visual media and the arts at Boston's Emerson College, Hadi returned to his home town to work in his family's production studios. But he eventually decided to pursue his own design path, creating residential interiors and special events that sealed his reputation and inspired him to launch Burlesque. Hadi cites a wealth of influences: films by Tim Burton, Stanley Kubrick, Pedro Almodovar and Tarsem; graffiti artworks, tattoos, kitsch and Mexican art. "I'm deeply inspired by Art Deco, more specifically the 'dark deco' style you see in the Gotham City architecture of old Batman cartoons ... the French influence - from Rococo and Louis XIV to the Empire style and Egyptomania - is very visible in my work as well." Restaurants also inspire him. "Mmm, The Russian Tea Room, and Tavern on the Green in New York and Les Trois Garcons in London." Hadi's long-term goal is to set standards in interior design. "My mission is to create a style that is definitely mine, which would be taught in schools in the future. And to open a bigger gallery in London, Paris and New York. As clichéd as this may sound, it's every designer's dream." In the face of the economic slowdown, trusting his instincts and going against the grain to create something that transports people to another world, is paying off, with a growing clientele spreading as far afield as Saudi Arabia and Qatar. "Burlesque's clientele is for those who appreciate and understand art. The sophisticate and the eccentric. Those who set trends, rather than follow them." <em>Burlesque, Villa 6, Al Wasl Road, Dubai; 04 346 1616; </em>