Abu Dhabi Has Built World-Class Museums. Art Licensing Is the GCC’s Next Growth Story
On December 11, Guggenheim Abu Dhabi opens its doors as the largest museum in the Guggenheim network. It joins Louvre Abu Dhabi, Zayed National Museum, the Natural History Museum, and teamLab Phenomena in a single cultural district. Few cities anywhere have assembled that much cultural infrastructure in such a short time.
What interests me most about this moment is a commercial detail that rarely makes the headlines. The region’s museum story began with a licensing deal. Abu Dhabi licensed the right to use the Louvre name, and in 2021 it extended that license to 2047, with a reported payment of €165 million for the additional decade. For two decades, the Gulf has been one of the world’s most ambitious licensees of museum brands. The next chapter is becoming a licensor.
Museums have become a licensing category of their own!
For years, many museums treated licensing as an extension of the gift shop. That view has changed quickly. According to Licensing International, the art property type grew 5.7% in 2025, its fourth consecutive year of growth, inside a global licensing industry worth $389.8 billion.
Immersive experiences at museums and galleries sit within a location-based category that grew 6% globally in the same year.
At Brand Licensing Europe this month, museums and heritage institutions had their largest presence to date. Walking the floor, I saw The National Gallery, The British Museum, and many other institutions presenting their licensing programs, and my own meetings included MFA Boston and the V&A, among others.
Licensing events like this one have become the place where cultural institutions meet the manufacturers and retailers who can carry their collections into everyday life.
The institutions leading this space treat their collections as living brand assets. They build style guides, choose product categories carefully, and work with partners who can carry a collection’s meaning into homes, wardrobes, and offices around the world.
Where the Gulf stands today
The region has already taken a first step. In 2025, Louvre Abu Dhabi launched Made with Louvre Abu Dhabi, inviting UAE-based SMEs to design products inspired by the museum’s architecture. Selected products are sold through the businesses’ own stores and the museum boutique, with a 5% royalty paid to the museum. It is a well-designed program. It supports local business, keeps quality under the museum’s control, and turns the building itself into a design source.
Saudi Arabia is building in parallel. Its Museums Commission is mandated to encourage individuals, institutions, and companies to produce and develop content for the sector as part of a national push to expand museums across the Kingdom.
What these initiatives share is their direction. They are local and inbound, designed mainly for visitors and residents. When I wrote about art licensing in the Middle East two years ago, the strongest examples involved Western collections arriving in the region through regional partners. The opportunity now runs the other way.
What a Gulf museum has to license
Gulf institutions hold assets that global licensees actively look for. They have architecture with instant visual recognition, centuries of geometric and calligraphic tradition, and collections that connect the Arab world with Africa, Asia, and Europe.
Guggenheim Abu Dhabi’s collection is organized around themes that include popular culture, land, language, and storytelling. Read with a licensing eye, that list doubles as a product development brief.
Aesthetics need care when they travel. In The Authenticity Formula, aesthetics is one of the four dimensions we use to examine how brands hold up across cultures. Visual identity is often the first thing to break when a brand enters a new market. A geometric pattern lifted from its context becomes decoration. The same pattern, carried with its story, gives a buyer abroad a reason to care.
Licensing Gulf heritage well means protecting the meaning behind a design along with the design itself, which is why authenticity is a licensing requirement from the first conversation with a partner.
From boutique program to global licensing program
Moving from a museum shop to shelves in London, Tokyo, or New York takes a different kind of preparation. It starts with rights. Collections often include works on loan, works by living artists, and buildings owned by separate entities, so an institution needs a clear map of what it can license, in which categories, and in which territories.
Protecting that intellectual property across markets comes next. Then comes an asset library with a style guide that explains the meaning behind each motif. A designer in Milan should understand why a pattern matters before adapting it.
Category choice follows. Home décor, stationery, fashion accessories, food and beverage, and experiences each carry different risks for a cultural brand. The right first category is the one closest to the institution’s identity.
Finally, partners. The right licensee abroad understands both the culture and the commercial mechanics and treats a collection as a world worth extending. These are the same qualities licensing partners look for in a property before they sign, applied in reverse.
A stand of its own
At Licensing Expo in Las Vegas this year, I walked the entire floor and found no exhibiting brand from the Middle East. The Gulf now has museums that the world travels to see. I would like to see one of them take its own stand at a global licensing show, with a program built for international partners.
I have worked with some of the world’s leading museums to introduce their collections to this region and grow their business here, and that work continues today. I have spent my career between art and licensing, and I believe the region’s collections are ready for that stage. When a product on a shelf in Paris carries a story from Abu Dhabi, the region’s cultural investment will have reached its next audience, and I intend to help put it there.
References
AE World, “Guggenheim Abu Dhabi Sets December 2026 Opening Date,” July 29, 2026. https://aeworld.com/lifestyle/art/guggenheim-abu-dhabi-sets-december-2026-opening-date/
Remote Lands, “Guggenheim Abu Dhabi Finally Sets Opening Date.” https://www.remotelands.com/travelogues/guggenheim-abu-dhabi-finally-sets-opening-date/
French Ministry of Culture, announcement of the extension of the Louvre Abu Dhabi brand license to 2047, December 3, 2021. https://www.culture.gouv.fr/switchToLanguage/306160/fre-FR
Hurriyet Daily News / Agence France-Presse, “Louvre Abu Dhabi contract extended until 2047.” https://hurriyetdailynews.com/louvre-abu-dhabi-contact-extended-until-2047-169843
Licensing International, “Museums Mean Business as Licensing Industry Reports Continued Global Growth,” 2026. https://licensinginternational.org/?p=86655
Licensing International, “Global Licensing Industry Grows 5.45% to Reach $389.8 Billion as Brand Licensing Europe Opens,” October 6, 2026. https://licensinginternational.org/news/global-licensing-industry-grows-5-45-to-reach-389-8-billion-as-brand-licensing-europe-opens/
License Global, “Museums Drive Growth in Global Licensing Industry as Art Sector Records Fourth Consecutive Year of Gains,” October 7, 2026. https://www.licenseglobal.com/heritage/museums-drive-growth-in-global-licensing-industry
Interempresas, “Las principales tendencias que impulsan el sector del licensing,” June 2, 2026. https://www.interempresas.net/Licencias/633570-Las-principales-tendencias-que-impulsan-el-sector-del-licensing.html
Louvre Abu Dhabi, “Made with Louvre Abu Dhabi” press release, February 12, 2025. https://prod-cm.louvreabudhabi.ae/-/media/2025/4th-feb-press/20250212ladsmecollaborationpressreleaseen.pdf
Louvre Abu Dhabi, “Made with Louvre Abu Dhabi” FAQ, 2025. https://prod-cm.louvreabudhabi.ae/-/media/2025/4th-feb-press/updated-docs/updated_eng_faq-made-with-louvre-abu-dhabi-initiative-2025.pdf
Abu Dhabi Media Office, “Louvre Abu Dhabi launches Made with Louvre Abu Dhabi initiative.” https://www.mediaoffice.abudhabi/en/tourism/louvre-abu-dhabi-launches-made-with-louvre-abu-dhabi-initiative/
Saudipedia, “Museums Commission.” https://saudipedia.com/en/article/331/government-and-politics/commissions/museums-commission
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