Rami Al Ali Fall 2026 Couture: The Desert Between Us

by · WWD
Rami Al Ali Fall 2026 Couture Collection at Paris Couture WeekCourtesy of Rami Al Ali

On the global geopolitical chessboard, the Middle East is too often reduced to a powder keg filled with differences and strife.

But for Rami Al Ali, recent flashpoint episodes have proved that on the contrary, “when we have something catastrophic, we’ve noticed how much we are really united instead of separated,” he said after his fall couture show.

In particular, it put a spotlight on how many share “the same roots — identity, craft, sun, [the] desert,” he continued. That vast expanse became the inspiration for an elegant collection of finely dosed drama that charted its changes from dawn to dusk.

Opening the show was a gown whose geometric folds and mother-of-pearl embellishments were a nod to the ghutra, a square scarf worn across the Gulf region to protect from the elements, usually by men. Al Ali said that when a woman wears one, it signifies “resilience and protection.”

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The palette took cues from dunes and desert light that went from pearly whites and golds to grays and blacks, albeit with a hint of shimmer, while also playing on familiar sights.

Al Ali used layered mother-of-pearl sequins with crystals to mimic palm-tree scales on column dresses, while an asymmetric gold gown owed its weave to the fabric of traditional tents, at once “rough, natural [yet] very luxurious,” he said.

Other textures and adornments nodded to cultural exchanges that saw the East and the West travel through the region. “Through the Silk Road, we have been given and taken a lot,” he said, pointing out damask, gold-leaf work and curling stylized botanical motifs that evolved as they traveled back and forth across cultures.

But you didn’t need to know all of that to appreciate his finely turned silhouettes, which favored long and lean columns. His work charmed the most in looks that had a certain undone quality to them, such as an asymmetric draped sheath that looked like it had loosely been draped into place, and another where a strap seemed to have slipped, although its fold was too precise for pure accident.

From the way they moved, these silhouettes also showed that in a week split between those designers who reach for sculptural pure fantasy and others who seek to slip into the life less ordinary of their well-heeled clients, Al Ali is the latter.