The New Magrabi Eyewear Campaign Enlists Aseel Omran, Sumaya Rida, Salem Al-Dawsari and Ali Kalthami
The four cultural tastemakers have come together for See Through Our Eyes, a cinematic Eid campaign lensed across Riyadh
There’s an alluring, old-world quality to See Through Our Eyes, the new Eid campaign by Magrabi. Shot in a dreamy palette animated by flickers of neon light, the film catches its four protagonists in passing through tiled alleys, floodlit pitches, low-lit interiors and the glass façades of the financial district. Eyewear shifts from scene to scene, frame to frame: a sculptural cat-eye in one cut, a wire aviator across a night drive in the next. By the end of the film, the breadth of Magrabi’s offering is apparent, a series of serious style moments and moods.
The luxury eyewear house, long synonymous with optical expertise in the Gulf, has centred its latest campaign around four of the country’s most iconic cultural figures, in a choose your-own-adventure format filmed in Saudi. After an opening film that introduces the four protagonists, the viewer selects one to follow through two alternate storylines, allowing each figure’s routine, environment and point of view to come forward on their own terms. The result is an immersion powerfully rooted in context, anchored to the city its icons call home.
Aseel Omran is the Diva, and she plays her with the awareness of someone who knows exactly how to enter a room. Born in Riyadh, the actress, singer and UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador first rose to prominence on the pan-Arab talent show Gulf Stars and has amassed a regional following in the millions in the years since. She sweeps between scenes in tinted oval frames and scarlet shades, the eyewear cut to match fabulous floor-length gowns. Sumaya Rida plays the Visionary. Having moved from a five-year career in business into acting in 2017, she has become one of the defining forces in post-Vision 2030 Saudi film. Here, she takes us into Riyadh after dark, moving through Souq Al Zal in oversized frames, worn with the nonchalance of an off-duty muse.
Salem Al-Dawsari, the Midnight Athlete, is captain of the Saudi national team, best known for the goal that beat Argentina 2-1 in the opening match of the 2022 World Cup. He summons the composure of an athlete who has spent more than a decade performing under pressure. Ali Kalthami is the Creative; his look playful and retro, seventies-leaning squares and softly tinted aviators. As the mind behind Mandoob (Night Courier), the 2023 noir that broke Saudi box-office records on opening and signalled a new range for the country’s cinema, he understands the aesthetic potential of Riyadh.
As the cast suggests, eyewear should be as adaptable and individual as the person wearing it, ready for the playing field, the set, the souk or the boardroom. Such frames are an investment that performs, with style, across the many contexts a single life now spans.
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