Fans of classic cars, coffee and pizza can rejoice, there’s an unusual place in Abu Dhabi where you can park up and indulge in all three at once.

Part café, part vintage car show room, DRVN Coffee offers a community space for automotive admirers in the United Arab Emirates to sip lattes and savor a slice of Margherita surrounded by some of the world’s rarest wheels.

The concept is the brainchild of Rashed Al Fahim, who launched DRVN in 2019 to unite his three great passions and provide a public viewing gallery for some of his father’s classic car collection.

Al Fahim is now responsible for the 100-strong roster, but he hasn’t always wielded such autonomy. Once told never to lay a finger on any of the vintage vehicles that made up his father’s beloved collection, Al Fahim responded by taking by his father’s 1964 Jaguar E-Type out for a drive, without permission.

By the time the owner realized his car was missing, it was already too late. His son had taken it to a garage, where pieces of the iconic British speedster lay strewn across the floor — the start of a restoration process that would take seven years to complete.

Today, Al Fahim runs his father’s collection without needing to resort to such subterfuge, but that hasn’t rendered him exempt from parental scolding.

“Ever since, it’s been this cat and mouse game,” Al Fahim told CNN.

“I try to touch one of his cars, change one of his cars. He yells at me but then ends up being proud of what we’ve accomplished.”

Formerly a commercial airline pilot for Emirates, Al Fahim jotted down his business plan on a long-haul flight from Dubai to Manila.

Fittingly, the first shop opened just a stone’s throw away from Al Bateen Executive Airport, with two more stores opening since, across the city and in Dubai, just off the Palm Jumeirah, the man-made archipelago.

Given his lineage, it was perhaps inevitable that Al Fahim would eventually drop down from the sky to the road. In 1958, his grandfather Abdul Jalil Al Fahim opened an auto-repair shop that has since expanded into ALFAHIM Group, a family-owned conglomerate with business interests spanning real estate, energy and travel.

The company is now led by Mohammed Abdul Jalil Al Fahim, whose penchant for vintage cars rubbed off on his son from an early age.

“We’d arrive at school and all the other kids are gathered around this classic car and parents are looking,” Al Fahim recalled of his childhood.

“I wanted to share that passion that so many other people share, but turn it into an experience that not only car lovers could enjoy, but (also) those who know nothing about cars. It’s just being surrounded by this automotive culture.”

“(And) When you go for a drive or you take your car out, the destination always seems to be a coffee shop,” he added.

DRVN has played host to car meets, where locals park their finest wheels, as well as Formula One screenings and Pilates classes. There’s effectively only one guiding principle at the coffee shop: if a car can be bought in a public showroom, it won’t be on display.

That strict adherence to showcasing only the most unique of rides has seen some lucrative wheels roll into the cafe, from a race-converted Mercedes-Benz 300 SL with Brad Pitt’s signature, to another Mercedes model — the 600 Pullman — that ferried Queen Elizabeth II on her state visit to Abu Dhabi in 1979.

According to Al Fahim, almost $400 million-worth of Porsche history, including the maker’s first ever model, was once on display at the Dubai store, which opened in partnership with the legendary German manufacturer in 2022.

Foreseeing a “much bigger” future for DRVN, Al Fahim is eyeing further international expansion for the business as he seeks to capitalize on the passion for cars beyond the Middle East.

“Every car that’s built, it’s a form of art,” he said. “These engineering marvels are what built humankind, and it will continue to be like that.”

Sources: https://edition.cnn.com/travel/drvn-coffee-classic-cars-abu-dhabi-spc