Clothes with Arabic Poems; Designer Taha Yousef pays tribute to the Middle East

Taha Yousef, the renowned designer, was born in Sharjah but currently calls Toronto his home. He fuses poetry of the Middle East with Western streetwear – an apt way of paying homage to two places that hold a great place in his heart.

“I was born in the UAE,” explains Yousef, founder of streetwear brand LoveClosely. “My childhood was there, I went to school there and moved to Toronto when I was a teenager. It really stayed with me, and have gone through things like 9/11, that always stuck with me that this is how the West perceived us.”

In an attempt to strengthen his link with the Mena region once again, Yousef is taking his clothing brand to his birthplace.

Growing up, he found that those around him had a very negative perception about the Middle East, with little to no idea about the rich cultural heritage. Eager to remedy that, he set about developing his own clothing company that would meld the two.

“I got into fashion to use it as a medium to showcase the beauty that exists in the Middle East and South Asia. It is not appreciated for its art forms, for its history, or the beauty of the Arabic language.”

Leaning on Arabic poetry, Yousef started to weave phrases and imagery into his designs, creating streetwear classics such as oversized tracksuits, with Arabic text running down the side seam, and baseball shirts with “The Sun rises in the East” emblazoned across the back, in dual languages.

The result was LoveClosely, launched in late 2018, which soon developed a loyal fanbase, including musicians such as Jessie Reyez, Riz Ahmed, Roy Woods, Yuna, Ali Gatie, Drake’s producer OVO 40, and French Montana.

Now, the brand is now keen to bring its new range, entitled Birds of Love, back to the MENA region (including a website showing prices in AED) and launch its latest products online on Monday, 27 July.

True to its name, the new collection has taken its inspiration from a poem by Attar of Nishapur called Conference of the Birds, which was written in 1177 and is widely regarded as a masterpiece of Persian literature. With its soaring allegories about the fruitless quest for the joy that can only be found within, Yousef has taken a bird motif to scatter throughout the series. As a message, despite being over eight hundred years old, Yousef feels the poem is now more pertinent than ever.

“In a post-pandemic world, a lot of people have been forced away from their nine to five lives, of always being busy and always having something to do. Now we have been put in a position where we have to question the choices we are making, and I wanted to take this very historic piece of poetry and take the message from it and present in a way that it will resonate now.”

LoveClosely is also an attempt to capture the cultural heritage by turning away from using higher end fabrics such as satin and heading towards upcycled fabric off-cuts instead. With the new collection patch-worked from leftovers of various types of content, with seams all left frayed, the result is a distinctly urbane aesthetic with an emphasis on environmental responsibility.

“Switching over to something sustainable is something we wanted to do all along. We are carrying such a meaningful message in our clothing, we also want where that clothing comes from to be meaningful. It took quite a bit of time to really source waste materials, and everything is a little different from each other as a result, and it’s exciting,” says Yousef.

“Our culture is very beautiful in itself, and there should be a lot of pride in who we are. We can show people that this is being accepted at an international level by people who are not necessarily Arab, and we can take pride in it”, he added.

To further develop the bond with the city, the accompanying promotional photos for the new collection were shot in Marrakech by Moroccan artist Ismail Zaidy, who is known for his raw takes on Arabic identity. For Yousef believes that having an Arabic artist involved was important, almost as important as bringing the Arabic inspired clothing back to the Middle East.