
Desert Roses: Dolce & Gabbana Makes KSA History By Presenting Its First-Ever Saudi Show at AlUla
Flanked by the inscribed cliff faces of Jabal Ikmah, the Italian fashion house’s starlit showcase played out in the canyon known to be an ancient crossroads of civilisations. An apt choice for the brand’s first-ever show in The Kingdom…
Dolce & Gabbana rarely do shows by halves. Inspired by all things majestic, Stefano and Domenico’s brand is the kind whose ‘go big or go home’ ethos has stood them in good stead in the mercurial pantheon of Planet Fashion since they burst, piñata-like, onto the scene back in the mid-80s. A colourful, forthright and, frankly, stratospheric career has followed, and whatever your personal style – or opinion – no one can deny the brand’s global impact, fame and legend. It is no less than a behemoth in the fashion world; not for everyone, but certainly as impossible to ignore as the lavish aesthetic it has built an empire on.

So to make the choice to show its famed Alta Moda, Alta Sartoria and Alta Gioielleria collections in Saudi – a place as fearless as the brand – holds a certain bold poetry. And it was another slice of synergy that saw them send in the cavalry for the show in the Kingdom, played out against the otherworldly majesty of AlUla’s ancient rocks as the sun (and temperature) dipped low.

Celebrating time-honoured equestrian heritage, Dolce & Gabbana displayed its trademark opulence alongside the Ikmah Fashion Cavalry Show, splicing its men’s and womenswear between local horse wranglers dressed in traditional thobes, each proudly parading 12 Arabian steeds down the catwalk in between the models. A literal, and beautiful, marriage of two cultures.

Even the horses understood the Dolce assignment; regalia-drenched in kaleidoscopic tassels and saddles, and with the occasional bedazzled dagger sheath tucked into belts for good measure, the pomp and pageantry befitting of any Dolce & Gabbana show was masterfully woven throughout.
And of course, the fashion show never just stops at the catwalk. Flying in a mixture of its most-cherished (and most extravagantly dressed) clients from Japan, the US and Saudi itself, as well as regional press and a handful of influencers, the 200-seat extravaganza was both a chance for show-goers to don their finery, and a palpable moment in the history of both fashion and KSA – a quantum leap from a mere handful of years ago when fashion shows in the Kingdom were outlawed.

Now, among the dunes, majlises and air-kissing fashion caravanserai (the fash pack have been doing socially distanced greetings for years), Saudi’s best-dressed women wore candy-coloured power suits and leather tailoring instead of abayas to sit front row, revealing the rapid evolution, and acceptable face of change of female fashion in Saudi.
Apt, then, that this meeting of cultures and historic flagpole event took place beside AlUla’s Jabal Ikmah; a mountain near the ancient city of Dadan which served as “a caravan way station for many peoples, and one of the clues that AlUla was truly a crossroads of civilisations.” The mountain was visited by “those wishing to leave their inscriptions and offerings en route through AlUla,” and you can still see the hundreds of carvings on the cliff faces in Aramaic, Dadanitic, Thamudic, Minaic and Nabataean, lending it the moniker of the world’s ‘open library’.

“AlUla is a cradle of creativity with artistic endeavour stretching back thousands of years – we are now once again a place to welcome and inspire all areas of arts,” said Phillip Jones, Chief Management and Marketing Officer of the Royal Commission for AlUla. With its very first fashion show now under its belt, AlUla – and Saudi’s – inspiring history continues to be written. Only this time, in Italian.
See highlights from the show below.
From Harper’s Bazaar Arabia’s February 2022 issue.