YOUNG&HAPPENING
F for...
What Dreams
are Dr aped of...
By Vani Sar aswathi
“Noor is an extremely talented, self-
motivated person. She is in a position to get
whatever she wants, yet she works really
hard, and is willing to do what it takes. She
checks every little, minute detail. Usually
designers supervise, but we encourage our
students to be more hands-on.”
– Sandra Wilkins, Area Chair, Fashion
Design, VCU-Q
S
he is all of 23, and has already
dressed Haifa Wehbe, Arab
music’s most popular star.
With maturity that belies her
age and modesty that cloaks her achieve-
ments, Sheikha Noor Al Thani spreads
out her sketches on the cafe table. At that
meeting, four months ago, she says little,
and leaves it to her cousin to fill in about
her personality.
We sat down again, on the first day of
Ramadan. She has a lot more to display,
a lot more to say. In four months, she
has had two more shows – in Beirut and
Rome. She is different too – still soft
spoken and mature, but more confident
and forthcoming.
A graduate of fashion design from
Virginia Commonwealth University in
november 2005 26
YOUNG&HAPPENING
The stunning wedding dress, with a high collar made of Swarovski crystals,
received great response
foray, she participated in her first Euro-
Qatar, Noor Al Thani was born into
pean show – the Italian Fashion Week
affluence, but has sweated and sewn her
2005- 2006 in Rome, a show entitled
way forward, gaining recognition and
‘An Oriental Night’ directed by Wafiq
making a mark abroad, where her fam-
Salbeikh.
ily name does not automatically extend
“I had chosen Breaking the Ice as my
favours. Last year, she was among the
theme for the Oriental Night, as in many
winners of the most promising designer
ways that was what I did then. I broke
award at the Lux Fashion Show in Beirut,
the ice.
for young designers.
“I am very shy and closed. Most Qatari
In August this year, she went once
women are. I expressed myself through
again to Lebanon for the show Hiqayet
my art. My paintings, my designs. I
Musamam (Designer’s Story); the theme
showed 16 pieces in Rome. That show
demanded a traditional piece, and she
would not have been possible without
came up with a stunning ‘toubanashel’.
the support of HH Sheikha Mozah bint
She also figured in the Honour’s Book,
Nasser Al Misnad. I was sponsored by
the youngest of 10 designers featured.
Qatar Foundation, and I owe a lot to
her. Without her, my dreams would have
While in Rome...
remained so.”
And just before her second Lebanon
The Rome show gave her unprecedent-
ed exposure.
“Haifa Wehbe liked a dress I showed
there... I had hand painted flowers on
it. And it hangs in her wardrobe now. A
Lebanese team which came for the show
photographed my creations and showed it
to her. She liked it and her agents got in
touch with me. And I was only too happy
to gift it to her,” beams Noor.
“A lot of people from Doha have ap-
proached me to do their evening wear
and casual clothes. Response has been
good from abroad too. After the Rome
fashion show, I received a call from Lon-
don to design a wedding dress, after she
saw the one on show. For the show I had
done a wedding dress, with a Swarovski
crystal collar. I have a person in Leba-
november 2005 27
Favourite Designer
“Vivienne Westwood. A British
Designer. She is so totally funky, crazy
and stylish. I like her designs and her
personality.”
Fabric of choice
“I love to work with raw silk; and I love
pink and off-white.”
Favourite Accessory
“Ear rings. For my designs, that was the
only accessory I used. I designed one,
and in different colours to suit each
design. It was in Swarovski crystals.”
Flair for the Abhaya
Despite the designs she spins, Noor
is always clothed in an abhaya. Little
wonder, that she is toying with idea of
an abhaya line.
“I want to try something different.
Play with fabrics and cuts. To experi-
ment. I want to explore possibilities
– at present it is rather impractical.
You get abhayas only in crepe or other
synthetic material. It is so hot in Qatar,
and we are wearing multiple layers...”
Female Designers
Why are male designers so much more
popular? “Probably because people
feel they know how to dress a woman.
But I feel women designers understand
a woman’s body better. They will be
more adept at dressing other women.”
Faux Pas
“I hate to see people not dressing
appropriately for their age. Youngsters
wearing clothes meant for older ones,
and vice versa. You can’t blindly follow
trends, the clothes should suit you.”
Food for thought
“A lady came up to me in London
and was telling me I should work on
designs for bigger women. The clothes
available now are so ugly. We went
to Milan and Rome on an educational
trip from VCU and we saw at Versace
that buyers were ordering special sizes
depending on the market. That is an
interesting concept. You get the same
beautiful design, but to suit your size.
You need to keep you customer in
mind, put their needs first.”
YOUNG&HAPPENING
non who specialises in accessories, so I
worked with him and he executed my
idea,” says Noor.
Seeking a signature
Noor grew up with colours, patterns
and designs. She grew up watching her
father, Hamad bin Salman Al Thani – a
renowned artist, paint. “He excels in so
many different styles, that you won’t be
able to connect one work to another. And
somewhere I picked up that trait. My
designs are so different. It is good in one
way. There is variety. At the same time,
I am not getting my ‘signature’... but I
guess the paintings on my designs is my
‘signature’,” she adds as an afterthought.
Last year, Noor participated in her first
big event, in the Lux Fashion Show in
Lebanon, winning a promising young
designer award.
“For that I had shown two from my
Senior Collection at VCU and two done
exclusively for the show. This year, it was
a totally new collection.The concept itself
was so removed from what I did last year.
“I work on hundreds of sketches and
play around with my designs before
november 2005 28
finalising. I make sure that some part
of every dress I design and execute, I
work on with my own hands. I paint on
it, I airbrush. It is not my creation just
because I design. It is not my creation if
I sketch it and someone sews it. I need to
be involved in it. If I don’t touch it, it is
not mine,” she emphasises.
“Painting still continues to be a pas-
sion. I escape to my painting when I am
stressed or angry. It clears my mind.”
Even as her father inspired, her entire
family encouraged her. “I keep dressing
up my cousins, sisters and even my mum.
YOUNG&HAPPENING
The dress that caught the eye of Haifa Wehbe
When I showed in Rome, they were all
there by my side.”
Dressing up the men
While she has been zipping around show-
ing her creations, Noor has also been
holding down a full time job at the Qatar
National Olympic Committee, (QNOC)
facing tough assignments and tight
deadlines.“Though my job at QNOC is
to design as well, the work is so different
from what I do otherwise. I am design-
ing clothes for Qatari sportsmen, I am
working against a tight deadline. This is a
totally different ball game.
“I have been given a freehand, in that
I don’t have to stick to maroons and
whites. But I have been educating myself
too. Looking at anti-bacterial fabric
for one... I need to show the designs to
QNOC bigwigs for approval in two
months. There are two categories of
kits I need to work on. One is for the
competitions and the other for opening
ceremony,” she says, barely hiding her
pride.
“My family is most supportive. But
I want to be self-sufficient. I spend my
november 2005 29
entire salary on my creations. It is an
expensive business. I need to travel to
source material – fabrics, accessories,
beads... I go to Dubai, to Lebanon.”
She recently attended an exhibition in
Paris, on new trends in fabrics, yarns,
accessories. “I participated mainly to
educate myself. To get to know what is
new in the market for the future.”
Mixed response
Noor interned at a local boutique briefly,
and realised that while some Qataris
loved to work with a Qatari designer,
many don’t want to wear their designs.
“It is difficult for them to realise that I
am Qatari and a qualified designer and
will do a good job. They feel Western
designers are more aware of trends.
However, western designs also need to
be altered for local need,” she points out.
“Mainly because of the weather and
wearing the abhaya. We have to wear
light fabrics. But the cuts and patterns
are the same. Qatari women are very
aware of fashions and trends. Even the
youngsters are so aware.”
Recounting a family anecdote, she
says, “Though I am designing now,
when I was in school I wore whatever my
mother picked up and gave me. But my
sister who is only seven years old, is so
opinionated – she will not wear a design
she doesn’t approve of. She is so particu-
lar. So when I am buying or designing
a dress for her, I make sure she is totally
involved in it.”
She says that she is not yet completely
satisfied with her work. “I sometimes
feel something is missing in design.
That I need to go the extra mile. I do get
depressed when my designs don’t satisfy
me. But I have my mentors. My teachers
at VCU. I go to them to clear up stuff,
get their comments.”
“My dream is to offer the world a
International ‘Ready to Wear’ line,
originating from Doha. I am discuss-
ing the idea with fellow designers here,
to present an international line, with a
local touch. But the immediate task is
the show to be held in Doha – for the
opening of the refurbished women’s store
at Salam Studios and Stores.”
Worldwidewoman slug name
One small, but strong

Voice against gesture of Rosa Lee

Parks changed the

discrimination course of history.

She refused to give up
her bus seat to a white

Rosa Parks passes man in Alabama, in

1955. And with that, she

away
inspired an entire race
to stand up for its rights.
The mother of America’s
civil rights movement
died last month, at the
age of 92. WT pays trib-
ute to this truly inspir- Left: Rosa parks being arrested after her act
ing woman. of defiance
Above: The historic bus

throughout southern USA, while racial
discrimination kept blacks out of many
jobs and neighbourhoods in northern
USA.
The seamstress, an active member of
the local chapter of the National Associa-
tion for the Advancement of Coloured
People, was riding on a Montgomery city
bus on Dec 1, 1955, when a white man
demanded her seat.
Parks refused and she was jailed and
later fined $14.
But her one-woman act of defiance
inspired 50,000 blacks in Montgomery
to join in a historic 381-day boycott,
organised by a then little-known Baptist
felt that I had a right to be treated as any
other passenger. We had endured that
kind of treatment for too long.”
She added, “At the time I was arrested
I had no idea it would turn into this. It
was just a day like any other day. The
only thing that made it significant was
that the masses of the people joined in.”
The 1956 Montgomery bus boycott,
which came two years after the Supreme
Court’s landmark declaration that sepa-
rate schools for blacks and whites were
“inherently unequal,” marked the start of
the modern civil rights movement.
It culminated in the 1964 federal Civil
Rights Act, which banned racial dis-
crimination in public accommodations.
Parks Institute for Self Development,
which she founded in 1987 to develop
young leaders.
She worried that young people take
legal equality for granted and said that
older blacks “have tried to shield young
people from what we have suffered. And
in so doing, we seem to have a more
complacent attitude.”
“We must double and redouble our
efforts to try to say to our youth, to try
to give them an inspiration, an incentive
and the will to study our heritage and
to know what it means to be black in
America today,” she said.
“As long as there is unemployment,
war, crime and all things that go to the
of us to continue until all have rights,”
she said at the June 1999 ceremony for
the latter medal.
Parks was the subject of the documen-
tary “Mighty Times: The Legacy of Rosa
Parks,” which received a 2002 Oscar
nomination for the best short documen-
tary.
Parks’ health had been declining for
the past 10 years. She was said to be suf-
fering from dementia and had stopped
making public appearances.
In one of her last interviews, when
asked what she would want people to
say about her, after her death, she said,
“I’d like people to say I’m a person who
always wanted to be free and wanted it

P
minister, Rev Martin Luther King Jr.
So they walked, finally refusing to Still, after taking her public stand for infliction of man’s inhumanity to man, not only for myself; freedom is for all
arks, a mild-mannered daugh-
endure their daily humiliation on the civil rights, Parks had trouble finding regardless – there is much to be done, human beings.”
ter of a teacher and a carpenter,
city’s buses. work in Alabama. Amid threats and and people need to work together,” she She said the love of freedom was
was 42 when she commit-
Parks’ bravery became the catalyst harassment, she and her husband, Ray- once said. instilled in her from childhood by her
ted the act of defiance that
for a movement that broke the back of mond, moved to Detroit in 1957. Even into her 80s, she was active on grandfather – her mother’s father with
changed the course of American history
legalised segregation in the US. She worked as an aide to Rep John the lecture circuit, speaking at civil rights whom she lived when she was growing
and earned her the title of ‘midwife’ or
Speaking in 1992, Rosa said history Conyers from 1965 until retiring in groups and accepting awards, including up. He taught his children and grand-
‘mother’ of the civil rights movement.
too often maintains “that my feet were 1988. Raymond Parks died in 1977. the Presidential Medal of Freedom in children not to put up with mistreat-
At that time, Jim Crow laws in place
hurting and I didn’t know why I refused Parks said upon retiring from her job 1996 and the Congressional Gold Medal ment. “It was passed down almost in our
since the post-Civil War Reconstruction
to stand up when they told me. But the with Conyers that she wanted to devote in 1999. genes,” Parks wrote in her 1992 autobi-
required separation of the races in buses,
real reason of my not standing up was I more time to the Rosa and Raymond “This medal is encouragement for all ography, My Story
restaurants and public accommodations

november 2005 30 november 2005 31