Fashion Trust Arabia 2025: Meet the Finalists Redefining Fashion from MENA to the World

The Fashion Trust Arabia Prize has become the region’s most anticipated stage for spotting tomorrow’s icons.

This year marks yet another milestone: eighteen finalists from across the MENA region and three guest designers from India, all bringing radically fresh perspectives to what fashion in 2025 can and should look like

Ready-to-Wear: Three Worlds, One New Language

This year’s Ready-to-Wear finalists don’t just make clothes — they shape identities. Each house is rewriting what it means to get dressed in 2025, fusing heritage, architecture, and emotion into silhouettes that are far from ordinary.

Abadia (Saudi Arabia), led by Shahd AlShehail, brings a poetic approach to contemporary heritage. Her latest collection dives into the sea — literally. Inspired by her grandfather’s pearl diving rite of passage, pieces are fluid, pearlescent, and quietly strong, designed for women who embody resilience and grace. Abadia has always honored Saudi craft, but here it does so with a sense of courage, movement, and fluid femininity

Coccellato (Tunis/Dubai), the house of Iman Coccellato, is radical in its intimacy. His garments are described as talismans — sculptural silhouettes that act like soft armor, cut from deadstock fabrics and molded by hand. Every stitch feels ritualistic, every dress an ode to women who command attention without asking for it. Coccellato’s vision is cinematic, influenced by Almodóvar heroines, brutalist furniture, and the unapologetic femininity of the women who raised him. It’s slow fashion elevated into cultural manifesto

Late For Work (Morocco), by Youssef Drissi, injects the category with sharp wit and unapologetic cultural critique. The label bends irony and tailoring into one, playing with uniforms, workwear codes, and the absurdities of modern hustle culture. Drissi uses clothes as commentary — clever, conceptual, but still utterly wearable. His ready-to-wear isn’t about blending in; it’s about reframing the everyday into something subversively chic .

Together, these three labels show how MENA ready-to-wear is carving its own space on the global stage: rooted in memory, sculpted by craft, and fearless in its storytelling.

Evening Wear: Glamour, Redefined

If evening wear once meant predictable gowns and predictable glamour, the FTA 2025 finalists prove that the category is alive with fresh energy, rooted in heritage but leaning into the future.

Ziyad Albuainain (Saudi Arabia) pushes evening wear into architectural territory. His work is known for its sharp construction and sculptural drama — garments that don’t just drape but stand. Albuainain’s pieces are less about decoration and more about structure, channeling Saudi minimalism and bold modernity into statement gowns that feel like moving architecture. They whisper power rather than scream excess.

Dana Almulla (Qatar), by contrast, leans into elegance as a conversation between past and present. Her designs celebrate timeless femininity, but always with a twist — silhouettes that balance delicacy with strength, embroidery that nods to heritage while speaking in a modern accent. Almulla’s evening wear feels like a bridge: one foot in cultural roots, the other in global dialogue.

Onori (United Arab Emirates), led by Sharifa Alsharif Alhashemi, redefines evening wear with a philosophy of timeless essentials. The brand blends the romance of vintage silhouettes with modern minimalism, creating gowns that are understated but unforgettable. Onori’s evening wear is not about extravagance, but about quiet confidence — pieces meant to be worn, remembered, and cherished for decades.

Together, these three voices show that in 2025, evening wear from the region isn’t a costume for the night — it’s an attitude. One rooted in architecture, heritage, and intentional design, reshaping what it means to walk into a room and truly own it.

Accessories: Between Disruption, Poetry, and Heritage

If clothes tell a story, accessories shout the punchline. The three finalists in this category are united by their refusal to see “shoes” or “objects” as mere functional add-ons — instead, they become vessels for identity, memory, and cultural reinvention.

TALEL (Morocco), founded by Leila Roukni, is a manifesto as much as a brand. Rooted in defiance, TALEL celebrates anti-conformism, making accessories that challenge systems and spark conversations. Shapes, volumes, and structures are pushed into sculptural, unexpected territories, daring wearers to step into the future while carrying their individuality like armor. TALEL isn’t about fitting in — it’s about swimming against the current, turning accessories into tools of disruption.

DUHA (Tunisia/UAE) is where poetry meets soles. Architect-turned-designer Duha Bukadi creates shoes not just as fashion but as personal mythology. Her work is about breaking and rebuilding — shoes as promises, as foundations for stories that rise from cracks and dust. Inspired by her grandmother’s bold Charles Jourdan heels and her own winding journey from architecture to design, DUHA turns footwear into talismans of resilience and freedom. Each pair is less about matching an outfit and more about walking unapologetically in your own truth

THUNA (Kuwait), co-founded by Sharifa Alsulaiti and Altaf Almudhayan, reclaims heritage and transforms it into sleek, modern luxury. Their designs reinterpret traditional Arab footwear like the madas, reshaping it into contemporary pieces for women who move with confidence. Each shoe carries cultural symbolism — from motifs inspired by Kuwait’s iconic towers to henna collaborations with artist Azra Khamissa — making THUNA not only a footwear label but a cultural movement. Their ethos? “Elevate your everyday,” with craftsmanship that bridges heritage and global luxury

Jewelry: Memory, Heritage, and Modern Alchemy

Jewelry at the FTA 2025 Awards is more than sparkle — it’s memory made wearable, heritage recast in gold, and identity carved into precious stones. This year’s finalists each approach jewelry as both an intimate ritual and a bold cultural statement.

Patrick Boghossian (Lebanon) represents legacy reimagined. A sixth-generation jeweler and gemologist, Patrick draws from his family’s deep ties to gemstones but infuses them with architectural daring. Think Le Corbusier’s lines, Niemeyer’s curves, or Mondrian’s abstractions translated into sculptural fine jewelry. His work blends history with geometry, offering pieces that feel timeless yet distinctly modern.

Farah Radwan – FYR Jewelry (Egypt) transforms cultural wounds into adornment. Rooted in Egyptian heritage, FYR is a brand of resilience and resistance, where jewelry acts as armor, talisman, and poetic rebellion all at once. Signet rings, chains, and amuletic pieces merge ancient pharaonic codes with punk subversion, creating heirlooms that carry both sacredness and defiance. For Radwan, jewelry is transmission — from ancestor to child, from history to future — turning scars into symbols of strength.

Clara Chehab (Lebanon) works at the intersection of raw sensuality and fine craftsmanship. Since launching her namesake line in Paris in 2023, Clara has become known for her striking juxtapositions: aquamarine against topaz, peridot with rubies, rough textures meeting graphic shapes. Her jewelry celebrates bold color and feminine softness, informed by her Lebanese roots and global life journey. Each piece is meant not only to decorate but to become part of a woman’s personal story — a fragment of memory carried in gold.

Debut Talent: The First Sparks of Tomorrow

There’s something raw, unfiltered, and electrifying about the Debut Talent Award. This category is where fashion hasn’t yet calcified into a formula — it’s instinctive, urgent, and full of firsts. The 2025 finalists embody that restless energy, each shaping fashion as both a personal manifesto and a cultural gesture.

Alaa Alaradi (Bahrain) moves between sculpture and fabric, Gulf roots and Swiss precision. With training at Saint Laurent and Acne Studios, and a master’s degree from HEAD — Geneva, Alaradi’s work is about contrasts: silhouettes that are both light and raw, strong yet airy. Her graduate collection, Further Deeper Softer Closer, captured this instinctive duality — a search for freedom expressed in draped forms and sculptural movement.

Ayham Hassan (Palestine) is fiercely rooted in place. Growing up in the West Bank, Ayham uses fashion to reframe Palestinian identity and craft under occupation. A Central Saint Martins graduate, his practice collaborates with local artisans, preserving traditional tailoring and textiles while pushing them into new, visceral expressions. His pieces are raw, earthy, and reflective of resilience — garments as both self-expression and shield. For Hassan, fashion is political, intimate, and collective all at once.

Fatma Elshabbi (Libya) works with memory. Her brand reflects nostalgia, fragments of Tripoli, and the traditions she carries even in distance. Through craft and emotional storytelling, she transforms absence into presence, weaving memory into form. Her work is subtle but resonant, the kind that asks you to lean in closer to feel its weight.

Fashion Tech: Craft Meets Code

If fashion is about imagination, Fashion Tech is where that imagination hacks the system. This year’s finalists collapse the distance between craft and code, between heritage and hardware, to show us just how elastic fashion can be.

Assaad Awad (Lebanon/Spain) is a shapeshifter of disciplines. After years in advertising, he moved into wearable design, working with icons like Lady Gaga and Madonna. His current work fuses traditional craftsmanship with 3D scanning and printing, creating hybrid pieces that are as much artifact as they are future relics. Awad proves that technology doesn’t erase heritage — it reanimates it, giving ancient practices a new digital skin

Zahia Albakri (Jordan) engineers garments as wearable architecture. Think bendable, meltable, hacked textiles; fabrics embedded with electronics; 3D-printed structures that shift and transform. Her brand isn’t just about clothes — it’s about building moving, interactive bodies, where sustainability and experimentation meet in hacked materials that redefine what fabric even means

TOUCHLESS (Bahrain), the brainchild of sisters Dalal and Fatema Alkhaja, transforms the accessory game with 3D-printed handbags. Their designs, made from sustainable TPU plastics, eliminate waste and mold-driven production. Ultra-light and futuristic, these bags are now carried at Selfridges London and Saks Fifth Avenue Bahrain — proof that eco-conscious doesn’t mean boring. With roots in architecture, business, and their father’s 3D-printing experiments, the sisters bring both storytelling and science into their craft. A TOUCHLESS bag isn’t just carried; it’s coded with narrative

Guest Country 2025: India Joins the Conversation

This year, India takes the spotlight as FTA’s guest country. With Kartik Kumra (Kartik Research), Ankur Verma (TIL), and Akhil Nagpal (AKHL) in the mix, the cultural dialogue stretches beyond borders, amplifying the shared language of craftsmanship and innovation

Beyond the Prize: Why FTA Matters

Of course, the FTA is more than a trophy. Winners will receive up to $200,000 in grants, mentorship with The Bicester Collection, and the chance to retail at Harrods and Ounass. It’s the kind of ecosystem the MENA fashion industry has long needed: financial support, creative guidance, and international exposure rolled into one

From Doha to the world, the FTA 2025 finalists remind us that fashion in the region isn’t about following global waves — it’s about creating them. Expect boldness. Expect poetry. Expect new names you’ll soon see everywhere.

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