Amina Debbiche vividly recalls the exact moment she knew she needed to preserve the Middle East’s cultural heritage. She was poolside at a Sunday brunch in Dubai, chatting with her future business partner, Nora Mansour. Mansour casually mentioned cataloging an extensive art collection for a Lebanese collector who trusted her implicitly. Debbiche’s response was immediate and visceral: “Oh my God, I want to do that too.” That spontaneous, sunlit moment became the foundation of The Open Crate, a groundbreaking digital inventory service tailored specifically for private art and luxury collectors across the Middle East and beyond.
The concept behind The Open Crate is simultaneously innovative and necessary. It combines high-tech solutions with expert human oversight, allowing clients to manage their collections with absolute confidence. “What we created doesn’t exist anywhere else,” Debbiche tells MILLE. “We provide a tech solution that puts your collection in your pocket via an app, but there’s also a specialist at your fingertips who manages it—like an AI art companion, except we’re real people.” This hybrid model has made The Open Crate invaluable for collectors who otherwise struggle with the complexities of tracking provenance (history of ownership or origin), documentation, and accurate valuation of their collections.
For Debbiche, who transitioned from finance to art through stints at prestigious auction houses like Christie’s, the region’s art is a personal revelation. Moving to Dubai ten years ago sparked her rediscovery of Arab culture and art history. “Europe often paints North Africans and Arabs in a diminishing way, which colonized my brain,” she admits candidly. “But in Dubai, I fell in love again with my Arabness, discovering artists like Algeria’s Baya, pioneers even more avant-garde than their Western contemporaries.”
Mansour shares a parallel journey with her own nuanced twists. With an extensive background in finance and a tenure at PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC), her connection to the art world blossomed through family influence and intimate experiences in Paris and London. Visiting galleries and museums with her aunt, she found her calling. “Being surrounded by art daily, I realized this was where I truly belonged,” she reflects. Back in Dubai, faced with a collector’s sprawling, disorganized art inventory, she saw firsthand the urgency for systematic documentation—sparking the idea that eventually evolved into The Open Crate.
The founders’ commitment runs deeper than mere business. They see their roles as custodians of cultural heritage in a region frequently stripped of its identity by conflict and colonial histories. Debbiche recalls a pivotal moment, vividly etched in her memory: “I saw ISIS burning books and destroying heritage in Syria, and it shook me profoundly.” She continues, “When genocide occurs or artifacts are looted, you don’t know where these cultural pieces might end up. Our goal is ensuring that if that happens, there’s a way to track them back.”
Navigating provenance issues is particularly challenging in the Middle East due to fragmented colonial histories and opaque acquisition channels. Mansour describes their methodology as akin to investigative journalism, demanding certificates, literature citations, invoices, and meticulous exhibition records to reconstruct and authenticate the history of each piece.
The Open Crate’s digital solution, built entirely from scratch due to concerns about data security, offers peace of mind that traditional services can’t match. As Mansour explains, “We own and guard the data. With Dropbox or Gmail, your data belongs to them. We couldn’t risk that.” Their meticulous process involves thorough documentation, verification, and even valuation, ensuring each artwork, handbag, or luxury watch is authenticated and traceable.
The art world’s general resistance to technology posed initial challenges, as traditional collectors often hesitated to digitize their collections. However, the unexpected advent of COVID-19 accelerated their mission exponentially. As the world faced lockdowns and restricted movement, COVID-19 became a catalyst for digitization. Collectors realized the practical necessity of having remote access to their inventories. The Open Crate’s clients found unprecedented comfort and utility in their services, as exemplified by the poignant story of Maha, a Beirut-based collector initially resistant to digitizing her collection. After the devastating August 4th port explosions destroyed her home and art collection, the meticulous documentation and insurance facilitated by The Open Crate helped her recover 90% of its value. “It was a rare silver lining in an unimaginable tragedy,” Mansour notes.
The Open Crate offers more than digital inventory services. According to Debbiche, their comprehensive suite includes art advisory, cultural consultancy, valuation reports, and insurance services. “If a client outgrows a work or needs liquidity, we help them sell, privately or through auction. We also source artworks tailored specifically to our client’s tastes,” she explains. Mansour adds, “We help with everything from providing and retrieving certificates and invoices, to storage solutions, framing, insurance, and even curating the placement of art within homes. Our goal is to offer a 360-degree support system.”
Today, the duo lead a dedicated, close-knit team of six—all Arab women. Beyond running a successful enterprise, they aim to empower and educate the next generation of regional art experts. “There’s no formal education or scholarship to study collection management in Saudi or Tunisia, for instance,” Debbiche says, “We’re committed to training our interns comprehensively, ensuring they emerge knowing the most influential artists, both globally and regionally.”
But their vision extends beyond simple cataloging. They aspire to fundamentally shift power dynamics in the art world. “Decolonizing the art world starts with access and narrative control,” emphasizes Debbiche. “We empower our clients to reclaim their histories and cultural legacies, transforming them from passive subjects into active contributors to global cultural dialogues.”
As Arab women entrepreneurs navigating art and tech, two traditionally Western and male-dominated spaces, they knew it wouldn’t be easy, but as Mansour explains, “Being Arab women wasn’t something to overcome, it was our edge. From inception, our mission was to claim space where none existed and turn that presence into progress.” And that they did.
