Saudi Arabia held its first-ever fashion show featuring swimsuit models, in a poolside event featuring the design of Moroccan designer Yasmina Qanzal.
The show included mostly one-piece suits in shades of red, beige, and blue.
The show took place on the second day of the inaugural Red Sea Fashion Week at the St Regis Red Sea Resort, situated off Saudi Arabia’s western coast.
The resort is part of Red Sea Global, one of the so-called giga-projects at the heart of Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 social and economic reform programme overseen by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Prince Mohammed, who became first in line to the throne in 2017, has initiated a series of dramatic social reforms in a bid to soften Saudi Arabia’s austere image stemming from its historical championing of a purist form of Islam known as Wahhabism.
Those changes have included sidelining stick-wielding religious police who used to chase men out of malls to pray, reintroducing cinemas, and organising mixed-gender music festivals.
They have coincided with ramped-up repression targeting dissent, including from conservative clerics who might protest such moves.
