Prior to launching www.anazahra.com, the team that is entirely made of women (not to mention gorgeous ones) gathered for a photoshoot at the Villa Rotana hotel on Sheikh Zaid Road, Dubai.
As previously mentioned, this blog is in Arabic and it covers almost all aspects of a woman’s lifestyle. I contribute to this site and my section is about my fashion diaries in a very personal way. If you don’t read Arabic, feel free to use Google Translate http://translate.google.com/. I’m sure somethings might not make sense, but you’ll get the point.
So far, I hear that my diaries (which can get personal) are the most popular.. Ironically.
Here are some of my favorite pictures from the photoshoot
Aiisha Ramadan for www.anazahra.com
Aiisha Ramadan for www.anazahra.com
The Team - for www.anazahra.com
From Top Left to Right: Noora Al Ibrahimi, Nawal Al Ali, Aiisha Ramadan, Asmaa Mohamed,Ola Khseiroof
From Bottom Left to Right: Joelle Mardinian, Zoya Sakr, Nahida of Love & Label
In this photo, Joelle Mardinian, the very famous makeup artist and TV presenter on MBC TV, is wearing an Aiisha Ramadan golden one-shoulder fully beaded short dress from the Love Affair collection. This dress took 99 hours to make and the result is worth every bit. The golden shade worked so well with Joelle’s golden skin. Also, Joelle was about 7 or 8 months pregnant and the dress (due to its bubbly hem effect), hid the tummy and revealed the best parts of Joelle, which is practically everything else.
Thank you Ana Zahra, and thank you Joelle for making me proud.
When you meet Simone Heng after speaking to her on the phone, you smile immediately. Her voice is bigger than her petite figure. Her beauty is pure. Her personality is embraced by her honesty and the positive vibes she brings to any place she steps into.
Simone is a Radio and TV presenter and previously a model.
When it comes to Simone’s style, its sexy funky. Long dresses may drag her down if they didn’t come in smartly assorted colors and with minimum volume. However, short dresses pay her a tribute. She can wear a lot of color combinations, with or without belts, puffy or tight.. it all works.
In the below photo taken by Pink Pepper, Simone is wearing one of the Aiisha Barbie Dresses that also took its course on the runway at the Love Affair fashion show. It was one of the smallest pieces on the runway and it looked like it was custom-made for Simone. The gradient pink and fuchsia degrees compliment her skin tone.
Simone Heng wearing Aiisha Ramadan for Pink pepper
In fact, on the big bow on the back of the dress were some silver thread embroidery shaping some Arabic Calligraphy. The words meant Play, Laugh, Live and Love. In the project for Barbie, they were supposed to be simple messages to a generation fascinated by Barbie. For me, Simone did this dress justice.
Named as Hia magazine’s favorite whitening innovation, Olay White Radiance is giving you the chance to design your dream dress and have myself, Aiisha Ramadan, create it exclusively for you. Olay White Radiance features new whitening technology that works to penetrate skin cells, eight surface cell layers deep, delivering skin fairness with an even tone and soft glow from deep within.
To celebrate just how innovative White Radiance is, Olay has launched a competition for you to create your own dazzling innovation and design your dream dress. It can be a design for something you’d like to wear everyday, or on a once-in-a-lifetime occasion, but it must capture the essence of innovation and radiance. Submit your entry in five simple steps:
1. Register online on www.olayarabia.com (skip this step if you’re already a member)
2. Go to the Olay aisle in participating outlets* from May 23rd to June 5th,2010
3. Enjoy a skincare consultation from one of our Olay beauty consultant, then ask for your entry code
4. Design your dress then log on to www.olayarabia.com and use your entry code to upload your design.
You have till June 15th to do that, after which competition will be closed. A judging panel made up of fashion and beauty industry experts including myself, top magazine editors and an Olay representative will choose one winner from the UAE and one winner from KSA.
Winners will be announced by July 1st, 2010 so keep visiting our blog and www.olayarabia.com to see if your innovative, radiant dress is a winner!
And here I’m not talking about one of the 7 deadly sins, except some from my brother and my husband.
I hold my HP ENVY 15 and feel like I’m floating fashionably with technology. Its a piece of art esthetically bundled with powerful features. For me, this is premium 10 steps up.
In my line of work, I tend to rely a lot on computing even though I’m no technical person, but I know what it is like to have a user-friendly computer that can handle all sorts of programs I have to feed it from Adobe Photoshop to iTunes and the list goes on and on.
HP ENVY
Product and industrial designs attract me so much and that is something I earned from my husband, and relates a lot to fashion design. Like most women, I have 2 sides, more like moods. One that is vintage and warm; the other is industrial and minimalistic. When it comes to the Envy, its a sexy industrial piece! What brings the unisex appeal to it is the fact that the colors and the simplicity of it is so male’ish, yet, its elegance and the subtle floral drawings made by tiny pixels, give it the female thumbs up. Its minimal and compliments the fashion sense.
The beauty of a well crafted electronic device extends to its external components, and I have to say, I have never experienced such speed and stability in any PC I tried over the years.
I will not go through this laptop specifications, you can read that elsewhere, again I have to say 64bit computing coupled with an i7 Intel processor and fully functional 8 Gigabytes of RAM is what make this machine a super car of computing.
The ENVY is a great example of when a form follow function, but in this case I say beautiful form follows super functional design.
2 of the Barbie collection by Aiisha were dazzling the Zahrat Al Khaleej pages. I loved the mood created in the coverage, the innocence portrayed and the cuteness of the hair/ makeup/ the Louboutins and all.
From the Barbie Collection by Aiisha Ramadan
To give you a little insight on what I did with the Barbie collection, I chose to keep Barbie as I love it and as most of all love it too. Simple, cute, trendy and mostly pink! The fabrics were top quality Raw Silk, layers and layers of Italian Tulle to achieve the gradience I was looking for.
From the Barbie Collection by Aiisha Ramadan
However, to incorporate the cultural element, I hand-embroidered and CRYSTALLIZED™ – by Swarovski Elements Arabic calligraphy portraying words that speak to every kid. Simple words such as Youth, Beauty, Playing, Hope and so on, all in Arabic.
Remember what Queen Rania says.. “If you educate a girl, you educate a future”. This is one little way of contributing from my side and its just the beginning.
I mentioned a while ago that Emirates Woman Magazine has initiated a fashionable charity project called Fashion with a Heart. The team of Emirates Woman selected 10 of the very best designers in the UAE to work with. Each of the designers, of course including myself, was requested to make a bespoke dress that will be auctioned off at the Fashion With A Heart charity event that will take place at the Raffles Hotel Dubai, for the benefit Al Noor Training Centre for Children With Special Needs.
This project combines philanthropy and fashion where each of us, designers, have created a one-of-a-kind dress incorporating the themes of red, love and Fashion With a Heart concept. The 10 designers included myself, Aiisha Ramadan, Amato, Walid Atallah, Essa among others.
Aiisha Ramadan for Emirates Woman - Fashion with A Heart
Ironically, I was in touch with Al Noor last year and we had something in mind that didn’t work out. The good news is that now its happening and like I said before, its time to give back. In fact, its always time to give back!
My dress took an intensive month and a half and more than 30 yards of fabric!!! It was a sweet heart neckline, corset base bustier fully embroidered and beaded with Swarovski Crystals with layers and layers of tulle wired ruffles.I truly gave it my heart. In my opinion, if you want a dress to be auctioned, give it the best you can and don’t go cheap.
Not my favorite photo of myself, but the editor chose one that reflects my character the most. I’ll let the photo tell you more..
I will post a separate thread about the event when it happens as the date is TBC.
Few months ago I was hunting for a place to rent in Lebanon, Beirut, and make it my second hub. The plan is still going on, though postponed a bit. However, meanwhile, watch the report that the BBC World had me featured in:
Sunday, the 4th April, was the first live interaction on my blog and it happened to be with Chris Hassall, the Global External Relations Officer of Procter & Gamble. It was basically a comment/ question from his side and an answer from my side discussing blogs, its importance and its relevance to the Arab world.
On that night, I met with the team of P&G and of course with Chris. I enjoyed every minute of it and I specifically appreciated the ideas Chris and I exchanged. These ideas will soon be reflected on my blog. It’s always amazing to see things from a male’s perspective..
Chris Hassall, Aiisha Ramadan and Yassin Attas
P&G is actually a very active organization when it comes to charity and volunteering. One of their main products (PUR Water Filteration) is one that cleans any contaminated water and makes it drinkable. During the Haiti disaster for example, they gave away what was enough for much more than 300,000 people to drink for 90 days. To know more about PUR, visit http://tiny.cc/kg3s4, and Pur Water.
Having said that, from a fashion perspective, the brand “Aiisha” has few charity projects already in process and to be revealed very soon. Once of which is already in the very latest Emirates Women magazine under the topic of Fashion with a Heart.
@aiisharamadan Get Your FREE $500 TicketMaster Gift Card and See Your favorite concerts! Get Yours @ http://tiny.cc/iqdcc - posted on 27/08/2010 16:51:52
@lamodadubai Abso-f'in-lutely! - posted on 26/08/2010 02:37:11
@lamodadubai Merci cheri! Feel free to use Google Translator if u feel that Arabic sounds like Chinese to y - posted on 25/08/2010 23:17:55
Lately everytime I tell someone that I have great news, (s)he responds by: OMG! Ur pregnant! P.S If I were pregnant, U'd be the last to know - posted on 25/08/2010 23:16:06
@aiisharamadan Get to see Your Favorite Concerts 4 FREE! Enter email to win $500 TicketMaster Gift Card @ http://tiny.cc/34l8z - posted on 22/08/2010 08:09:28
@aiisharamadan Love the proofs from the AnaZahra shoot! You looked stunning! - posted on 22/08/2010 01:01:22
@aiisharamadan I remember and I'm very flattered. Thank you! - posted on 18/08/2010 19:22:57
@lamodadubai Remember what I call you my friend. You've earned it well - posted on 17/08/2010 22:34:10
A gum stuck to my shoes disgusting manners.. That's why there're bins!! - posted on 12/08/2010 23:07:03
@ShireneRifai Inti a7la hayeti! - posted on 02/08/2010 23:17:37
@ShireneRifai I just noticed that you look a little like Rachel Zoe - posted on 02/08/2010 22:19:37
I received a call this morning from 056-7424250 saying that I won 500,000 Dhs - According to the police this is the 5th complaint abt this # - posted on 02/08/2010 19:54:33
@ShireneRifai Ok.. I'll rest my jealousy on the side and look at the bigger picture - posted on 02/08/2010 19:32:51
@ShireneRifai I'm jealous - posted on 02/08/2010 18:43:51
disgusting manners.. That's why there're bins!! - posted on 12/08/2010 23:07:03