As it looks to carve its own niche on the global sartorial calendar, Dubai Fashion Week has raised its own stakes. This season, it has lured haute couturier Maison Sara Chraibi to join its schedule, alongside Dubai's own couture studio Michael Cinco and one of Malaysia's best known labels Rizman Ruzaini.
Alongside these big-name draws, all manner of smaller yet dynamic brands are also being showcased across the city. Here are the standout moments so far.
Rizman Ruzaini
How do you follow having Naomi Campbell walk the runway in your previous Dubai Fashion Week outing? That was the dilemma facing Malaysian designers Rizman Nordin and Ruzaini Jamil, who kicked off the autumn winter 2024 season. Their solution is instead to let the clothes do the talking, doubling down on a well-earned reputation for elegant glamour, such as this bombshell look of fishtail skirt and feathered jacket.
Maison Sara Chraibi
In something of a coup for the event, Moroccan haute couturier Maison Sara Chraibi brought its fresh-off-the-Paris-runway collection to Dubai. In a reshowing of its spring 2024 couture collection – with a handful of new pieces made especially for the event – the collection was inspired by the resilience shown after last year's earthquake in the country. Known for using traditional Moroccan handwork across its pieces, the designer is also the only Arab woman presently working in haute couture.
Mrs Keepa
Debuting its upscale new line Mrs Keepa Studio, the label let loose all its cutting skills. In a collection inspired by the ocean, what could have been a literal series of looks in shimmery blue, is instead an almost all-black parade of dresses reduced to sleek body-con lines and beautiful volume to represent forms such as nautilus shells, coral reefs and mermaids.
Selfmade
Leaning into its knack for denim, for autumn/winter 2024, Selfmade conjured some skilful looks from an assortment of upscaled jeans, trousers and jackets. Handled with restraint, the result is wearable, plausible and very self assured, with an effortless feel.
Emergency Room Beirut
Giving its ethos of upcycling old clothes into new, this edgy brand from Lebanon continues to extract treasure from ashes. This latest collection is notable for a button front jacket with furry sleeves – seemingly carved from a discarded child's blanket – and an intriguing parade of lace dresses reworked from old curtains and bedspreads. Charmingly rough around the edges, from the exuberant patchworking to the raw seams left on show, there seems to be no limit to the creativity within this label.
Michael Cinco
For the new season, Cinco pushed himself far out of his comfort zone and delivered a glorious collection that riffed on Japanese Samurai. Already well known for his sumptuous womenswear – Cinco was invited to join the celebrated ranks of Parisian haute couture for his red carpet dressing – he focused on his relatively new menswear line, in a gamble that paid off.
Amid the grand-yet-familiar ball gowns, Cinco delivered men's painted kimono, worn over crisp white shirts and a obi-style belt knotted at the waist; boxy, double breasted suits in blush; and cropped, square cut jackets and skirt-trouser hybrids in molten metal, for an entirely new narrative. With its dresses regularly snapped up by A-listers, this showing of menswear proved that Cinco has a lot more to say beyond big skirts and plunging necklines.
Tamkeen's offering
- Option 1: 70% in year 1, 50% in year 2, 30% in year 3
- Option 2: 50% across three years
- Option 3: 30% across five years
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
LIVERPOOL SQUAD
Alisson Becker, Virgil van Dijk, Georginio Wijnaldum, James Milner, Naby Keita, Roberto Firmino, Sadio Mane, Mohamed Salah, Joe Gomez, Adrian, Jordan Henderson, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Adam Lallana, Andy Lonergan, Xherdan Shaqiri, Andy Robertson, Divock Origi, Curtis Jones, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Neco Williams
What are the GCSE grade equivalents?
- Grade 9 = above an A*
- Grade 8 = between grades A* and A
- Grade 7 = grade A
- Grade 6 = just above a grade B
- Grade 5 = between grades B and C
- Grade 4 = grade C
- Grade 3 = between grades D and E
- Grade 2 = between grades E and F
- Grade 1 = between grades F and G
The specs: Lamborghini Aventador SVJ
Price, base: Dh1,731,672
Engine: 6.5-litre V12
Gearbox: Seven-speed automatic
Power: 770hp @ 8,500rpm
Torque: 720Nm @ 6,750rpm
Fuel economy: 19.6L / 100km
'Nightmare Alley'
Director:Guillermo del Toro
Stars:Bradley Cooper, Cate Blanchett, Rooney Mara
Rating: 3/5
Real estate tokenisation project
Dubai launched the pilot phase of its real estate tokenisation project last month.
The initiative focuses on converting real estate assets into digital tokens recorded on blockchain technology and helps in streamlining the process of buying, selling and investing, the Dubai Land Department said.
Dubai’s real estate tokenisation market is projected to reach Dh60 billion ($16.33 billion) by 2033, representing 7 per cent of the emirate’s total property transactions, according to the DLD.
Will the pound fall to parity with the dollar?
The idea of pound parity now seems less far-fetched as the risk grows that Britain may split away from the European Union without a deal.
Rupert Harrison, a fund manager at BlackRock, sees the risk of it falling to trade level with the dollar on a no-deal Brexit. The view echoes Morgan Stanley’s recent forecast that the currency can plunge toward $1 (Dh3.67) on such an outcome. That isn’t the majority view yet – a Bloomberg survey this month estimated the pound will slide to $1.10 should the UK exit the bloc without an agreement.
New Prime Minister Boris Johnson has repeatedly said that Britain will leave the EU on the October 31 deadline with or without an agreement, fuelling concern the nation is headed for a disorderly departure and fanning pessimism toward the pound. Sterling has fallen more than 7 per cent in the past three months, the worst performance among major developed-market currencies.
“The pound is at a much lower level now but I still think a no-deal exit would lead to significant volatility and we could be testing parity on a really bad outcome,” said Mr Harrison, who manages more than $10 billion in assets at BlackRock. “We will see this game of chicken continue through August and that’s likely negative for sterling,” he said about the deadlocked Brexit talks.
The pound fell 0.8 per cent to $1.2033 on Friday, its weakest closing level since the 1980s, after a report on the second quarter showed the UK economy shrank for the first time in six years. The data means it is likely the Bank of England will cut interest rates, according to Mizuho Bank.
The BOE said in November that the currency could fall even below $1 in an analysis on possible worst-case Brexit scenarios. Options-based calculations showed around a 6.4 per cent chance of pound-dollar parity in the next one year, markedly higher than 0.2 per cent in early March when prospects of a no-deal outcome were seemingly off the table.
Bloomberg
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Gender pay parity on track in the UAE
The UAE has a good record on gender pay parity, according to Mercer's Total Remuneration Study.
"In some of the lower levels of jobs women tend to be paid more than men, primarily because men are employed in blue collar jobs and women tend to be employed in white collar jobs which pay better," said Ted Raffoul, career products leader, Mena at Mercer. "I am yet to see a company in the UAE – particularly when you are looking at a blue chip multinationals or some of the bigger local companies – that actively discriminates when it comes to gender on pay."
Mr Raffoul said most gender issues are actually due to the cultural class, as the population is dominated by Asian and Arab cultures where men are generally expected to work and earn whereas women are meant to start a family.
"For that reason, we see a different gender gap. There are less women in senior roles because women tend to focus less on this but that’s not due to any companies having a policy penalising women for any reasons – it’s a cultural thing," he said.
As a result, Mr Raffoul said many companies in the UAE are coming up with benefit package programmes to help working mothers and the career development of women in general.
Like a Fading Shadow
Antonio Muñoz Molina
Translated from the Spanish by Camilo A. Ramirez
Tuskar Rock Press (pp. 310)
Company%20profile
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STAGE%201%20RESULTS
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EA Sports FC 26
Publisher: EA Sports
Consoles: PC, PlayStation 4/5, Xbox Series X/S
Rating: 3/5
STAY%2C%20DAUGHTER
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Fourth-round clashes for British players
- Andy Murray (1) v Benoit Paire, Centre Court (not before 4pm)
- Johanna Konta (6) v Caroline Garcia (21), Court 1 (4pm)
The biog
Name: Younis Al Balooshi
Nationality: Emirati
Education: Doctorate degree in forensic medicine at the University of Bonn
Hobbies: Drawing and reading books about graphic design
Game Changer
Director: Shankar
Stars: Ram Charan, Kiara Advani, Anjali, S J Suryah, Jayaram
Rating: 2/5
Ipaf in numbers
Established: 2008
Prize money: $50,000 (Dh183,650) for winners and $10,000 for those on the shortlist.
Winning novels: 13
Shortlisted novels: 66
Longlisted novels: 111
Total number of novels submitted: 1,780
Novels translated internationally: 66
Who's who in Yemen conflict
Houthis: Iran-backed rebels who occupy Sanaa and run unrecognised government
Yemeni government: Exiled government in Aden led by eight-member Presidential Leadership Council
Southern Transitional Council: Faction in Yemeni government that seeks autonomy for the south
Habrish 'rebels': Tribal-backed forces feuding with STC over control of oil in government territory
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