Fashion Trust Arabia Returns to Doha with a Trifecta of Celebrations to Cement the Region as An Emerging Hub for Luxury Fashion Incubation
By Angela Baidoo
Debuting in 2018 with a star-studded event attended by Pierpaolo Piccioli, Naomi Campbell, and Victoria Beckham, 2025 marks the 7-year anniversary of the Fashion Trust Arabia Prize (FTA). This year also marked a homecoming as the prize returned to Doha, Qatar for a series of events and stand-out exhibitions culminating in the awards ceremony on November 22nd 2025.
Rapidly developing as a luxury fashion destination for design talent attuned to the cultural nuances of the Middle-Eastern customer, we have witnessed a number of hubs manoeuvring for first place in the race to become the next experiential luxury fashion destination. Sports (Fifa Arab Cup, Qatar Grand Prix) and hospitality have already gained a firm footing in Doha, and with the FTA, fashion has begun to secure its own platform as an integral part of the cultural calendar. Amplifying the vision of designers from the MENA region to a global audience and key fashion stakeholders.
The judges for this year’s prize continued to raise the bar and demonstrated the wider industry’s growing interest and investment in the Middle-East. Daniel Roseberry, Remo Ruffini, Giambattista Valli, Bethann Hardison, Victor & Rolf, Roopal Patel, and Zuhair Murad to name a few.
The winners of the FTA Prize 2025 join a long list of designers and creatives who have gone on to positively impact the industry-at-large and were announced as Youssef Drissi of Late For Work (Ready-to-Wear), Ziyad Albuainain (Evening Wear), Leila Roukni of Talel (Accessories), Farah Radwan of FYR (Jewellery), Alaa Alaradi (Franca Sozzani Debut Talent), Fatema and Dalal Alkhaja of Touchless (Fashion Tech), and Kartik Kumra of Kartik Research (Guest Country India).
Two additional awards were presented at the ceremony, the recipients of which were recognised for their unparalleled contributions to shaping the industry and redefining the zeitgeist. Miuccia Prada was presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award and Lebanese designer Zuhair Murad – whose work elevating luxury Arab design has transcended borders – the Trailblazer Award.
This year’s hosts were Queen Latifah and Aiman Kaissouni, who were among the many A-list attendees and presenters, including Gisele Bündchen, Juliette Binoche, Adrien Brody, Tyra Banks, Lindsay Lohan, and Emma Roberts.
Defying Luxury Trends and Nurturing Regional Growth
Defying trends across the wider luxury market, luxury fashion drove growth and represented “43% of the total market” in 2024, growing by 6% and projected to reach $15B by 2027, according to the Chalhoub group. Attracting a wave of openings and tailored lifestyle experiences from Valentino, Loewe, Elie Saab, Louis Vuitton, Jil Sander and Maison Margiela.
In the same vein as adjacent fashion awards, which have nurtured, mentored, and financially supported emerging design talent, the FTA – founded by Her Highness Sheikha Moza bint Nasser (Honorary Chair) and co-chaired by Her Excellency Sheikha Al-Mayassa bint Hamad Khalifa Al-Thani and Tania Fares – is an initiative providing a platform, financial grants, mentorship programs, and much-coveted retail partnerships with luxury retailers including Harrods and the Middle-Easts leading luxury e-commerce platform Ounass.
A partnership with Kering was also announced in collaboration with the Franca Sozzani Debut Talent prize, offering the winner, Alaa Alaradi, a bespoke mentorship programme tailored to her individual needs.
This collaboration [with Kering] reflects the shared conviction of Kering and Fashion Trust Arabia, that the future of luxury requires to cultivate creativity, empower talent, and advance innovation”
Francesco Carrozzini, Co-founder Franca Fund, Filmmaker
7 Years of Impact and Beyond
Beyond the awards ceremony, the FTA launched a retrospective at the M7 museum; FTA: Threads of Impact (as part of Qatar’s 18-month campaign titled Evolution Nation) which will honour the cultural journey the country has been on over the last five decades.
Billed as a “landmark exhibition charting Fashion Trust Arabia’s influence in shaping fashion and championing designers from across the MENA region” it will be open until 3rd January 2026, showcasing the work of over 80 designers from across the 7-years of the prize. Demonstrating how Arab fashion is being redefined by the designers featured and how creatives from the region are not a monolith.
What is highlighted in the exhibition is that what unites these designers is a shared respect for craftsmanship, cultural identity, and heritage. Each themed room – Conscious Expressions, Sculpted Forms, Bloom, Future Forward – was a microcosm of the creativity of the region, reflecting both the differences and similarities shared across cultures and how luxury fashion can be rediscovered when it is viewed from the perspective of preserving heritage and artisan craftsmanship, yet looking to the future with technological innovation.
The exhibition was curated by founder and CEO of Lagos fashion week Omoyemi Akerele and will promote “human stories and the transformative power of fashion as a cultural force” long after the FTA Prize 2025 comes to a close.
The rise of designers from across the Middle-East and North Africa, who marry craftsmanship with technological innovation and cultural authenticity, will ensure the focus remains on the Fashion Trust Arabia Prize for their amplification of the emerging talent and future visionaries to watch.
The Fashion Trust Arabia Prize 2025 Winners
Ready-to-Wear Winner: Youssef Drissi, Late For Work
Moroccan designer Youssef Drissi’s mission is to combat societies ideas around imperfections, by considering deconstruction as a path to reinvention, Drissi’s brand ‘Late For Work’ is as offbeat, as it is daring, mixing directional cuts with emboldened shapes to propose clothing that enhances the wearers personality and are complex enough to adapt to life’s challenges.
The designer presented his collection during the Tranoi trade show in October which was backed by CANEX (Creative Africa Nexus – who are financially empowering many of Africas creatives with training and market access) and titled ‘I’m An Accountant’, flipping the traditional notion of workwear on its head, with cowl-neck blazer dresses in tailored checks and button-down shirts given a surrealist twist with multiple plackets. In 2018 the designer also won Best Young Designer in Africa at FIMA, and now, after securing the Fashion Trust Arabia Prize for Ready-to-Wear designer 2025, he is set to continue to disrupt convention across the industry.
“My brand challenges the norm through workwear and I would describe our aesthetic as undisciplined, disruptive and offbeat and through that we encourage our customers to embrace complexity”
Evening Wear Winner: Ziyad Albuainain
Saudi designer Ziyad Albuainain founded his label around the concept of conscious luxury in 2021. Influenced by a life lived across countries and continents – Al Khobar, Tokyo, Leysin, New York, and Milan – Albuainain’s namesake label, developed from responsibly sourced fabrics in London brings together a global vision that weaves in art and culture. His work was featured in Acne Paper’s 20th anniversary edition, with a liquid metal dress worn by Alek Wek, and the designer has also expanded into adaptable accessories which present as if objects d’art, with the Scrunch Bag-cum-hat being a particularly notable creation.
“The FTA Prize is an honour, not just for me but for the stories and cultures that I want to celebrate through my work as well as giving me the opportunity to grow, while creating collections that connect, inspire, and represent my community and where I’m from.
Accessories Winner: Leila Roukni, Talel
Moroccan Designer Leila Roukni’s label Talel has already developed a dedicated fanbase, attracted by her angular silhouettes which are a provocation to conventional silhouettes. Her handbags feel rebellious and disruptive in nature with their sharp corners and dramatic swoops giving each a sense of novelty. At a time when homogenisation has become the norm in order to navigate through an environment of sustained uncertainty Talel is making the case for leaning into individuality. Function does not always come first and in some cases is less of a consideration with positive results, ie. her fur textured triangular bag which she described to Hypebeast Arabia as “deliberately disproportionate [resisting] function to assert itself as something more than fashion”.
Talel can boast of experiencing an impressive level of success with a selection of her bold sculptural styles sold out with one of her major stockists, Kith. Confident that in learning to sit in the uncomfortable space that comes from forging your own path as well as “collective experimentation”, Talel can stand as a brand charting a course for true progress.
“Winning the FTA Prize [is] an invaluable validation of my vision and dedication and would open new doors to expand my brand, as well as contribute to the rise of inspiring and modern Arab fashion”
Jewellery Winner: Farah Radwan, FYR Jewelery
Based across Paris and Egypt (her collections are prototyped in Paris and meticulously handcrafted by artisans in the heart of Cairo), Farah Radwan’s Egyptian heritage informs FYR jewellery. Crafted from ‘noble metals’ that were the foundation of the creative process for her family when designing pieces for themselves, these metals embedded each ring, necklace or bracelet with an heirloom quality allowing them to be passed down across the generations
The industrial-style of her jewellery reflects the “untamed essence” she has referred to as being captured in her work. Connecting with the dreamers, the lovers, the poets, her jewellery is worn as an amulet conveying the power of ‘resilience and resistance’. Drawing on both the lessons and stories of the past, Radwan’s grandmothers jewellery box served as her first introduction to what is now a healthy obsession with the history that can be held within jewellery that adorns the wearer.
“FYR finds beauty in the raw and timeless. We explore concepts of the modern heirloom and reinvented basics by combining Ancient Egypt’s rich heritage in jewelry-making with the rugged aesthetics of our contemporary environment.”
Franca Sozzani Debut Talent Winner: Alaa Alaradi
Bahrain-born Alaa Alaradi spent her childhood between the Gulf and Switzerland, but once she dedicated herself to the pursuit of fashion she found opportunities to train with some of the worlds most recognised luxury fashion houses, from Saint Laurent to Acne Studios. Not only specialising in womenswear, she has developed a line of accessories and jewellery which compliment and harness the qualities of distortion and delicacy which can be found in her collections.
Graduating with her Masters in 2024 the themes of ‘fluidity and sculpture’ have become a signature within her work, since her graduate collection titled ‘Further Deeper Softer Closer’ her DNA has been solidified – pieced silk chiffon with seams creating a map of the body can be made up of as much as 18 pieces, while contrast stitching, twists and tucks create silhouettes that convey an airy lightness and strength in their distortion.
“The intention behind the collection was to explore something that is fluid and sculptural but at the same time, feminine and light, but strong…I wanted to do something very organic, so that when people come and feel the energy of the collection they can tell it has been made by the same hands”
Fashion Tech Winner: Fatema & Dalal Alkhaja, Touchless
Bahrain-based Touchless, founded by sisters Dalal and Fatema Alkhaja, comfortably sits at the intersection of ancestral craft and future innovation—an accessories brand shaped as much by the artisans’ touch as by the precision of 3D printing. Working with sustainable and flexible TPU plastic, the sisters have created lightweight, sculptural handbags that speak to their desire to move away from fast fashion and toward objects that feel purposeful, personal, and rooted in storytelling.
What began with their father’s introduction to 3D printing evolved during the 2020 lockdown into a practice of designing tools, accessories, and eventually wearable art for their community. Today, their pieces can be found in Selfridges London, Tryano Abu Dhabi, and Saks Fifth Avenue Bahrain, where they are celebrated for their distinct blend of creativity, sustainability, and rebellious attitude against excess. With backgrounds in interior architecture and business, they shape each design as an object of emotion and experiment—made for those who gravitate toward the extraordinary.
“We specialise in 3D printed handbags, but the idea is to have these incredibly sculptural forms, but you can relate to them because they are incredibly lightweight and flexible, and you can wear them as an everyday piece”
Guest Country India Winner: Kartik Kumra, Kartik Research
Since launching in 2021 Kartik Research, founded by Kartik Kumra has gained a loyal following, with a standing-room only show during Paris fashion week men’s in June. His artisanal brand – based in New Delhi – feels both aligned with a luxury consumer seeking out that spark of differentiation and at once deeply rooted in the craft techniques of his heritage. Creating a seamless push and pull between the past and the present. Referring to his collections as a revision-of-sorts of ‘old world craftsmanship’ all the embroideries that feature on his designs are sewn by hand and each woven fabric formed on a handloom, calcifying his desire to bring a ‘humanness’ back to the few items in daily life that we share an intimate relationship with, the very clothes that brush up against our skin every day.
Indias subcultures make up a significant part of Kumra’s research and play a key role in each seasonal collection, with inspiration pulled from ‘the aesthetics of 60s psychedelic rock to the Indo-modernist art of the 80s’ for past collections, while working closely with artisans local to his atelier to ensure forgotten Indian crafts are revived and introduced to global audiences.
“The idea of the brand is to work with some of the true expert artisans from across the country that specialise in very specific skills…and I want to stay away from being to romantic and sentimental with the clothing , which is why we work with people who are upcycling items from brands like Carhartt, which adds a little friction to the collections”