Elie Saab Unveils His Fall 2020 Haute Couture Collection

The beauty of Beirut is beyond words. Suspended somewhere between fantasy and reality, the city is a feeling, an experience, a lasting impression. Even a brief and fleeting encounter with the indescribable capital on the Mediterranean is enough to capture your heart and keep it. This is how its majesty persists, eternally coursing through the veins of the people that carry its memories and willful present.

Elie Saabs’ heart beats to the pulse of Beirut, the one place to which he will always find belonging, his home, his eternal muse. An unwavering love for its beautiful complexities forever inspires his artistic vision. Like the subtle smell of jasmine in spring, Beirut lingers in every silhouette he materializes and in every eternal woman he celebrates. Elie Saab designs with the city, with its vibrant cultural imaginary and its rich artistic heritage. The magical spirit of the city is essential to his creation, which is why he unveiled this Exclusive Haute Couture Collection in the aftermath of the devastation that recently befell the Lebanese capital. He owes Beirut a defiant act of hope. 

Only too familiar with the instability of loss as a Lebanese, the couturier intuitively knows the strength in being able to lace together realities that inspire the imagination. In this whimsical new collection, he shares with the world, he invokes the SACRED SOURCE, the throbbing life force that allows Beirut to triumph over and over again. In a time when humanity is forced to slow its rhythm, take pause and again find root in the soothing pace of nature, the Lebanese designer calls on the renewing energies of the elements to bring into being an enchanted world that endlessly blossoms and forever blooms.

Borrowing the soft palettes of a celestial sunrise, rich textures from the bounties of the earth and lines of calm flowing waters, he gives breath to a vestiary of beautiful divinities that embody the essences of his most beloved Beirut. Delicate in whispering blues and blush pink muslins, alluring in the glistening muted golds of the effervescent sun, bold in the gentle green of the undergrowth, each spirited woman comes into light from a clandestine trail in the woods. Like a subtle silk thread of morning mist, they gradually emerge, playing hide and seek between the transparency and shadow of organza trees. They are free to move and dance in organic silhouettes, to explore the vibrancy they are a part of as they transform and flourish. Some take flight as airy feathered wings catch the soft breeze while others cascade into landscapes of embroidered tulle.

The iridescent bride shimmers in the tones of renewal, mirroring the enchanted wood over which she reigns. In her gentle armor of silver strength, her feet barely touching the earth as she gracefully glides forward, courageously illuminating a trail into the foliage. She knows not where it leads but she is certain that it can only be better. And together, the radiant women move on with her.

Everything in this world seems fantastical and unreal, yet it is all so realizable. This is Elie Saab’s intent, to paint a path onward, a way for his Beirut to shine forward. For it is the ability to dream that gives breath to hope, to a future full of possibilities.