diff --git a/.dockerignore b/.dockerignore
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000..b8e239e404970606bfcdb1de674571831c6b75d2
--- /dev/null
+++ b/.dockerignore
@@ -0,0 +1,72 @@
+# `build_from_dir` can't find Dockerfile when `.dockerignore` is "*"
+# See https://github.com/swipely/docker-api/issues/484
+# Ignore all folders except qa/, config/initializers and the root of lib/ since
+# the files we need to build the QA image are in these folders.
+# Following are the files we need:
+# - ./config/initializers/0_inject_enterprise_edition_module.rb
+# - ./lib/gitlab.rb
+# - ./qa/
+# - ./INSTALLATION_TYPE
+# - ./VERSION
+
+/app/
+/bin/
+/builds/
+/changelogs/
+/config/environments/
+/config/helpers/
+/config/knative/
+/config/locales/
+/config/prometheus/
+/config/routes/
+/danger/
+/db/
+/doc/
+/docker/
+/ee/
+/fixtures/
+/templates/
+/lint/
+/lib/api/
+/lib/assets/
+/lib/backup/
+/lib/banzai/
+/lib/bitbucket/
+/lib/server/
+/lib/constraints/
+/lib/registry/
+/lib/policy/
+/lib/feature/
+/lib/flowdock/
+/lib/generators/
+/lib/gitaly/
+/lib/gitlab/
+/lib/api/
+/lib/token/
+/lib/mattermost/
+/lib/teams/
+/lib/storage/
+/lib/auth/
+/lib/peek/
+/lib/prometheus/
+/lib/quality/
+/lib/rouge/
+/lib/flaky/
+/lib/zip/
+/lib/sentry/
+/lib/serializers/
+/lib/support/
+/lib/check/
+/lib/tasks/
+/locale/
+/log/
+/modules/
+/plugins/
+/public/
+/rubocop/
+/scripts/
+/shared/
+/spec/
+/symbol/
+/tmp/
+/vendor/
diff --git a/.gitlab/ci/review.gitlab-ci.yml b/.gitlab/ci/review.gitlab-ci.yml
index 4a9269ffd82a095fdee7dae4fa92e588e1ac3791..3cbfa32d9a574d9c324bf1d0c565de232eb931bf 100644
--- a/.gitlab/ci/review.gitlab-ci.yml
+++ b/.gitlab/ci/review.gitlab-ci.yml
@@ -50,7 +50,7 @@ build-qa-image:
   <<: *review-docker
   stage: test
   script:
-    - time docker build --cache-from ${LATEST_QA_IMAGE} --tag ${QA_IMAGE} ./qa/
+    - time docker build --cache-from ${LATEST_QA_IMAGE} --tag ${QA_IMAGE} --file ./qa/Dockerfile ./
     - echo "${CI_JOB_TOKEN}" | docker login --username gitlab-ci-token --password-stdin ${CI_REGISTRY}
     - time docker push ${QA_IMAGE}
 
diff --git a/config/initializers/0_inject_enterprise_edition_module.rb b/config/initializers/0_inject_enterprise_edition_module.rb
index 4b21732e1797d18f9e4ec6b0670683491a3345ca..39595e23abec5f2fbb059d4fdce5e0fd044a4a59 100644
--- a/config/initializers/0_inject_enterprise_edition_module.rb
+++ b/config/initializers/0_inject_enterprise_edition_module.rb
@@ -1,5 +1,7 @@
 # frozen_string_literal: true
 
+require 'active_support/inflector'
+
 module InjectEnterpriseEditionModule
   def prepend_if_ee(constant)
     prepend(constant.constantize) if Gitlab.ee?
diff --git a/qa/Dockerfile b/qa/Dockerfile
index 74be373b8e811ff96d97b993a84ec6f9e5d8f659..3309f5b6ce36e3939666b4861c9809174b3098d1 100644
--- a/qa/Dockerfile
+++ b/qa/Dockerfile
@@ -47,9 +47,13 @@ RUN export CLOUD_SDK_REPO="cloud-sdk-$(lsb_release -c -s)" && \
     curl https://packages.cloud.google.com/apt/doc/apt-key.gpg | apt-key add - && \
     apt-get update -y && apt-get install google-cloud-sdk kubectl -y
 
-WORKDIR /home/qa
-COPY ./Gemfile* ./
-RUN bundle install
-COPY ./ ./
+WORKDIR /home/gitlab/qa
+COPY ./qa/Gemfile* /home/gitlab/qa/
+COPY ./config/initializers/0_inject_enterprise_edition_module.rb /home/gitlab/config/initializers/
+COPY ./lib/gitlab.rb /home/gitlab/lib/
+COPY ./INSTALLATION_TYPE /home/gitlab/
+COPY ./VERSION /home/gitlab/
+RUN cd /home/gitlab/qa/ && bundle install
+COPY ./qa /home/gitlab/qa
 
 ENTRYPOINT ["bin/test"]
diff --git a/qa/Gemfile b/qa/Gemfile
index 6abc0d622ad7e3e328ebafdd9f39ef86444285de..f04ecb13879a56f536808829b65d5c280b069fa8 100644
--- a/qa/Gemfile
+++ b/qa/Gemfile
@@ -1,6 +1,7 @@
 source 'https://rubygems.org'
 
 gem 'gitlab-qa'
+gem 'activesupport', '5.2.3' # This should stay in sync with the root's Gemfile
 gem 'pry-byebug', '~> 3.5.1', platform: :mri
 gem 'capybara', '~> 2.16.1'
 gem 'capybara-screenshot', '~> 1.0.18'
diff --git a/qa/Gemfile.lock b/qa/Gemfile.lock
index bf051a115b5962c5cb66b74b461713482d6a8039..d582d77c5cd45b1082c9b4b3ca056d0516ceffe6 100644
--- a/qa/Gemfile.lock
+++ b/qa/Gemfile.lock
@@ -1,9 +1,9 @@
 GEM
   remote: https://rubygems.org/
   specs:
-    activesupport (5.1.4)
+    activesupport (5.2.3)
       concurrent-ruby (~> 1.0, >= 1.0.2)
-      i18n (~> 0.7)
+      i18n (>= 0.7, < 2)
       minitest (~> 5.1)
       tzinfo (~> 1.1)
     addressable (2.5.2)
@@ -28,7 +28,7 @@ GEM
     childprocess (0.9.0)
       ffi (~> 1.0, >= 1.0.11)
     coderay (1.1.2)
-    concurrent-ruby (1.0.5)
+    concurrent-ruby (1.1.5)
     diff-lcs (1.3)
     domain_name (0.5.20170404)
       unf (>= 0.0.5, < 1.0.0)
@@ -38,7 +38,7 @@ GEM
     gitlab-qa (4.0.0)
     http-cookie (1.0.3)
       domain_name (~> 0.5)
-    i18n (0.9.1)
+    i18n (1.6.0)
       concurrent-ruby (~> 1.0)
     knapsack (1.17.1)
       rake
@@ -50,7 +50,7 @@ GEM
     mime-types-data (3.2016.0521)
     mini_mime (1.0.0)
     mini_portile2 (2.4.0)
-    minitest (5.11.1)
+    minitest (5.11.3)
     netrc (0.11.0)
     nokogiri (1.10.4)
       mini_portile2 (~> 2.4.0)
@@ -94,7 +94,7 @@ GEM
       childprocess (~> 0.5)
       rubyzip (~> 1.2, >= 1.2.2)
     thread_safe (0.3.6)
-    tzinfo (1.2.4)
+    tzinfo (1.2.5)
       thread_safe (~> 0.1)
     unf (0.1.4)
       unf_ext
@@ -106,6 +106,7 @@ PLATFORMS
   ruby
 
 DEPENDENCIES
+  activesupport (= 5.2.3)
   airborne (~> 0.2.13)
   capybara (~> 2.16.1)
   capybara-screenshot (~> 1.0.18)
diff --git a/qa/README.md b/qa/README.md
index bab19665dac339f30470d3dd47b18b475d7dcfee..97555f8d0c2687cde807bdfb110c1eac3fb29fad 100644
--- a/qa/README.md
+++ b/qa/README.md
@@ -123,10 +123,11 @@ To set multiple cookies, separate them with the `;` character, for example: `QA_
 
 Once you have made changes to the CE/EE repositories, you may want to build a
 Docker image to test locally instead of waiting for the `gitlab-ce-qa` or
-`gitlab-ee-qa` nightly builds. To do that, you can run from this directory:
+`gitlab-ee-qa` nightly builds. To do that, you can run **from the top `gitlab`
+directory** (one level up from this directory):
 
 ```sh
-docker build -t gitlab/gitlab-ce-qa:nightly .
+docker build -t gitlab/gitlab-ce-qa:nightly --file ./qa/Dockerfile ./
 ```
 
 [GDK]: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-development-kit/
diff --git a/qa/qa.rb b/qa/qa.rb
index 18fb4509dce0db86a76b6d1c01935b14cf29750c..8be2a28942271d83685d45e2b444e7313cadd085 100644
--- a/qa/qa.rb
+++ b/qa/qa.rb
@@ -4,6 +4,9 @@ $: << File.expand_path(File.dirname(__FILE__))
 
 Encoding.default_external = 'UTF-8'
 
+require_relative '../lib/gitlab'
+require_relative '../config/initializers/0_inject_enterprise_edition_module'
+
 module QA
   ##
   # GitLab QA runtime classes, mostly singletons.