Dubai Fashion Week announces preliminary schedule for spring/summer 2025

Dubai Fashion Week will be held from Sept. 1-7 this year at Dubai Design District (d3). (Supplied)
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Updated 17 July 2024
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Dubai Fashion Week announces preliminary schedule for spring/summer 2025

DUBAI: The global and regional fashion labels expected to set the upcoming spring/summer 2025 season’s biggest trends at Dubai Fashion Week have been announced.

Scheduled ahead of New York Fashion Week, DFW will be held from Sept. 1-7 this year at Dubai Design District (d3).

Co-founded by d3 and the Arab Fashion Council, DFW will feature more than 30 brands from France, India, Indonesia, Italy, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Malaysia, Palestine, Russia, the UAE and the UK, showing streetwear and haute couture collections alongside internationally acclaimed guest designers.

The event’s footprint extends citywide, with 40 invitation-only presentations, private dinners and collection launches hosted by global brands and industry stakeholders.

The first three days of DFW will focus on haute couture collections.

The final three days will spotlight ready-to-wear collections by acclaimed designers such as Alia Bastamam, April & Alex, Benang Jarum, BLSSD, Dima Ayad, Born in Exile, Buttonscarves, Choice, Heaven Lights, Riva, Self Made, Viva Vox and Weinsanto, presented and supported by the Federation de la Haute Couture et de la Mode, the governing body behind Paris Fashion Week.

The last day of the calendar will focus on private appointments and a buyers’ market.

Launching for the first time is the International Buyers Programme, enabling retailers worldwide to enrol in DFW’s tier benefits. The programme expands buyers’ reach and talent discovery through DFW and within Dubai’s vibrant fashion ecosystem, reinforcing the city as the region’s de facto fashion capital.

“Dubai is the pulsating heart of fashion in the region, and Dubai Fashion Week is disseminating its rhythm globally,” said Khadija Al-Bastaki, senior vice president of d3 – part of TECOM Group. “The collections and designers displayed on our runway inject diversity into the global fashion dialogue and demonstrate the powerful talent emerging within our region.

“DFW has unveiled incredible opportunities, partnerships and global networks to participating designers and buyers, and we look forward to pushing the envelope further with this latest edition that includes a new buyer’s platform, an expanded venue, more events and an extended schedule of designers.

“Dubai Fashion Week will once more raise the bar for fashion excellence and cement Dubai among the global fashion capitals,” Al-Bastaki said. 


REVIEW: ‘Shrinking’ season three flounders but Harrison Ford still shines

Updated 19 February 2026
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REVIEW: ‘Shrinking’ season three flounders but Harrison Ford still shines

DUBAI: In its first two seasons, “Shrinking” offered a smartly written, emotionally intelligent look at loss, therapy and the general messiness of human connection through the story of grieving therapist Jimmy (Jason Segel) — whose wife died in a tragic accident — and the village of flawed but recognizably human characters helping to heal him. Season three struggles to move forward with the same grace and thoughtfulness. It’s as though, encouraged by early praise, it has started believing its own hype.

For those familiar with co-creator Bill Lawrence’s other juggernaut, “Ted Lasso,” it’s a painfully familiar trajectory. That comedy also floundered in its third season. Emotional moments were resolved too quickly in favor of bits and once-complex characters were diluted into caricatures of themselves. “Shrinking” looks like it’s headed in the same direction.

The season’s central theme is “moving forward” — onward from grief, onward from guilt, and onward from the stifling comfort of the familiar. On paper, this is fertile ground for a show that deftly deals with human emotions. Jimmy is struggling with his daughter’s impending move to college and the loneliness of an empty nest, while also negotiating a delicate relationship with his own father (Jeff Daniels). Those around him are also in flux. 

But none of it lands meaningfully. The gags come a mile a minute and the actors overextend themselves trying to sound convincing. They’ve all been hollowed out to somehow sound bizarrely like each other.

Thankfully, there is still Harrison Ford as Paul, the gruff senior therapist grappling with Parkinson’s disease who is also Jimmy’s boss. His performance is devastatingly moving — one of his best — and the reason why the show can still be considered a required watch. Michael J. Fox also appears as a fellow Parkinson’s patient, and the pair are an absolute delight to watch together.

A fourth season has already been greenlit. Hopefully, despite its quest to keep moving forward, the show pauses long enough to find its center again. At its best, “Shrinking” is a deeply moving story about the pleasures and joys of community, and we could all use more of that.