Everything you need to know about Saudi designer Tima Abid’s Paris Haute Couture debut

Tima Abid Spring 2020 Couture. (Instagram)
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Updated 27 January 2020
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Everything you need to know about Saudi designer Tima Abid’s Paris Haute Couture debut

  • Saudi couturiere Tima Abid presented her first-ever collection during Paris Haute Couture Week
  • The collection boasted a lineup of show-stopping couture gowns mostly dreamed up at the designer’s Jeddah atelier

DUBAI: On Jan. 23, Saudi couturiere Tima Abid presented her first-ever collection during Paris Haute Couture Week. The Jeddah-born designer, who founded her eponymous womenswear label 16-years-ago, debuted her glamorous Spring 2020 couture offering during a candle-lit dinner held at Paris’ the Four Seasons Hotel Georges V, in the presence of her private clients, which included the royal family and Syrian singer Assala Nasri.

The show was set against the soundtrack of Tunisian singer Omayma Taleb’s soothing vocals, who serenaded guests for the first few looks of the 50-piece offering, which was a year in the making.

The indelible collection boasted a lineup of show-stopping couture gowns mostly dreamed up at the designer’s Jeddah atelier.

Featuring luxe fabrics such as crepe and tulle, embellished with gold and silver embroidery, beads, molded sequins and plumes, Abid’s range of body-hugging eveningwear is a true testament to the ability and skills she and her petit mains are undoubtedly capable of.

Standout pieces included a metallic skirt that ropes up the shoulder like a braid, another skirt made entirely out of metallic sequins and red and blue feathers as well as a wedding dress with bejeweled silk panels. There was perfectly-executed tailoring aplenty in Abid’s Spring 2020 couture collection, as well as waist-cinching corsets and embellished bolero jackets.

Indeed, Abid may be a newcomer to the couture week schedule, but she’s already proving to be a force to be reckoned with.


Highlights from Saher Nassar’s ‘Chronicles from the Storm’ exhibition in Dubai

Updated 27 February 2026
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Highlights from Saher Nassar’s ‘Chronicles from the Storm’ exhibition in Dubai

DUBAI: Here are three highlights from Saher Nassar’s ‘Chronicles from the Storm,’ which runs until March 18 at Zawyeh Gallery in Dubai.

‘Chronicles No. 1’

In his latest solo exhibition, the Palestinian artist “reimagines events that push past emotional capacity toward moral exhaustion, questioning the ethical certainty of the human spirit when faced with immense suffering,” according to the show catalogue, with works that “contemplate the devaluation of hope as a fundamental factor of human survival, sometimes revealed as currency for escape, sometimes seen in people resorting to their primal instincts to endure.”

‘Chronicles No. 8’

“Drawing from both personal and collective experiences, the exhibition unfolds as a layered reflection on how repeated trauma reshapes perception, belief, and the instinct to survive,” a press release for the show states. “Nasser translates lived realities into visual studies that move beyond immediate reaction. Rather than seeking resolution or catharsis, the works dwell in a state of moral exhaustion.”

‘Chronicles No. 3’

In “Chronicles from the Storm,” the UAE-based multidisciplinary artist is not attempting to offer answers, the press release suggests; rather, he is “bearing witness” and “inviting viewers to sit with unresolved questions and the uneasy persistence of the human spirit in the aftermath of the storm.” The works on show “carry a restrained intensity, resisting spectacle in favor of contemplation,” the release continues.