Adidas is continuing its appreciation of UAE culture by launching another Dubai collaboration, this time with henna artist Azra Khamissa.
Just weeks after their famed collaboration with Ravi Restaurant, the sportswear brand is linking up with Dr Azra, as she is known to her 150,000 Instagram followers.
Khamissa has taken her henna art to the world of trainers, decorating three pairs of adidas shoes for a display at the brand’s flagship store at The Dubai Mall.
“Adidas reached out to me and presented the concept of designing henna on shoes,” says Khamissa, who has inspired a new generation of henna lovers thanks to her unique take on the traditional practice.
“They were very happy to let me do whatever I thought was beautiful.”
Khamissa spent several weeks perfecting her designs, something she said proved a little more challenging than she had initially anticipated.
“I was experimenting with different types of henna, seeing how it would work on leather, seeing how it would stain, there was a lot of research,” she says. “It was challenging, as when the henna is really thick it would peel. The white leather would stain immediately so there was no room for error at all. But it was great fun to work with the architecture of the shoe.”
The shoes are currently for display purposes only and not available to purchase. However, the collaboration has been garnering a lot of attention.
“Many people have voiced that they are very interested in purchasing them, so you never know,” Khamissa says.
Khamissa, who is a chiropractor by day, started doing henna as an experimental pastime. After she posted a picture of her decorated hands on Instagram several years ago, Khamissa saw her innovative designs light a spark among her followers.
As well as putting her own spin on traditional motifs such as the rawayeb (henna on the tips of the fingers) and rubeya (a circle on the flat of the palm), her hands have been covered with leopard print; she has traced the phases of the Moon from her wrist to the tip of her middle finger; and even used her palms as a canvas to take a stand.
And, her collaboration with adidas is not the first time her work has been tapped by international brands. Earlier this year, she collaborated with Les Benjamins and created a bespoke collection.
“It’s been great to be able to do so many different things using henna as the base,” she says. “And, it’s been really interesting to take henna into the world of sneakers.
“Sneaker culture is huge, there’s been so much buzz. I didn’t really expect this kind of reaction when working with sneakers, but it’s really cool to see the hype and excitement that comes with sneaker culture, and it’s really interesting to be able to take henna into that world in a new way,” she says.
The collaboration is part of adidas’s commitment to use its flagship Dubai store to offer a platform for local creatives. It comes a month after its hugely successful limited-edition adidas x Ravi Restaurant trainers, which saw shoppers queueing at 4am to get their hands on pair.
The trainers sold out within hours, and soon appeared on resale sites, on offer for as much as Dh44,000.
The brand chose 11 restaurants in 11 cities as part of its “adilicious” campaign, each selected for the unique contribution made in creating and bonding a local community.
“My family has worked so hard to bring Ravi to where it is now, it has become more than just a restaurant with staff and customers, it has become a home that many grew up with," said Ravi's founder Chaudary Abdul Hameed.
"To say that Ravi had a humble beginning and is now representing Dubai as a key city with adidas is a milestone to celebrate.”
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
THE SIXTH SENSE
Starring: Bruce Willis, Toni Collette, Hayley Joel Osment
Director: M. Night Shyamalan
Rating: 5/5
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Starring: Ramy Youssef, Steve Carell, Jason Schwartzman
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Rating: 3.5/5
Jetour T1 specs
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In numbers: China in Dubai
The number of Chinese people living in Dubai: An estimated 200,000
Number of Chinese people in International City: Almost 50,000
Daily visitors to Dragon Mart in 2018/19: 120,000
Daily visitors to Dragon Mart in 2010: 20,000
Percentage increase in visitors in eight years: 500 per cent
Read more from Aya Iskandarani
The essentials
What: Emirates Airline Festival of Literature
When: Friday until March 9
Where: All main sessions are held in the InterContinental Dubai Festival City
Price: Sessions range from free entry to Dh125 tickets, with the exception of special events.
Hot Tip: If waiting for your book to be signed looks like it will be timeconsuming, ask the festival’s bookstore if they have pre-signed copies of the book you’re looking for. They should have a bunch from some of the festival’s biggest guest authors.
Information: www.emirateslitfest.com
BMW M5 specs
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more from Janine di Giovanni
Most F1 world titles
7 — Michael Schumacher (1994, ’95, 2000, ’01 ’02, ’03, ’04)
7 — Lewis Hamilton (2008, ’14,’15, ’17, ’18, ’19, ’20)
5 — Juan Manuel Fangio (1951, ’54, ’55, ’56, ’57)
4 — Alain Prost (1985, ’86, ’89, ’93)
4 — Sebastian Vettel (2010, ’11, ’12, ’13)
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Some of Darwish's last words
"They see their tomorrows slipping out of their reach. And though it seems to them that everything outside this reality is heaven, yet they do not want to go to that heaven. They stay, because they are afflicted with hope." - Mahmoud Darwish, to attendees of the Palestine Festival of Literature, 2008
His life in brief: Born in a village near Galilee, he lived in exile for most of his life and started writing poetry after high school. He was arrested several times by Israel for what were deemed to be inciteful poems. Most of his work focused on the love and yearning for his homeland, and he was regarded the Palestinian poet of resistance. Over the course of his life, he published more than 30 poetry collections and books of prose, with his work translated into more than 20 languages. Many of his poems were set to music by Arab composers, most significantly Marcel Khalife. Darwish died on August 9, 2008 after undergoing heart surgery in the United States. He was later buried in Ramallah where a shrine was erected in his honour.
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The Brutalist
Director: Brady Corbet
Stars: Adrien Brody, Felicity Jones, Guy Pearce, Joe Alwyn
Rating: 3.5/5
Six large-scale objects on show
- Concrete wall and windows from the now demolished Robin Hood Gardens housing estate in Poplar
- The 17th Century Agra Colonnade, from the bathhouse of the fort of Agra in India
- A stagecloth for The Ballet Russes that is 10m high – the largest Picasso in the world
- Frank Lloyd Wright’s 1930s Kaufmann Office
- A full-scale Frankfurt Kitchen designed by Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky, which transformed kitchen design in the 20th century
- Torrijos Palace dome
The specs
Engine: Dual 180kW and 300kW front and rear motors
Power: 480kW
Torque: 850Nm
Transmission: Single-speed automatic
Price: From Dh359,900 ($98,000)
On sale: Now
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