Lebanese fashion goes E.T.

Over the years, Lebanon has produced a fair number of fashion designers including Elie Saab, who is now a household name at Hollywood’s red carpets. But when it comes to brands, few up and coming prodigies will be able to compete with Appolo 11 Fardous. That’s right, Appolo 11 –his real first name–was recently featured on the local fashion program “Shou El Mouda” (What is the trend) aired on Lebanese channel New TV.

The host, needless to say, was highly intrigued.

Appolo, as she called him, explained that he was the eleventh child in the family and that his father was a fan of the space program. About half way through discussing his spring collection, she could not help but coming back to the name. Do you prefer “Appolo hedash” [in Arabic numbers] or simply “Appolo eleven” [in English]?

“Eleven”, he replied soberly.

Fadous then stated he was a US citizen and hoped to expand his collection stateside in the near future.

The host made two observations of his work:

1. A love of colors…

and bows:

2: The obvious “liberal” audience intended for his wedding dresses:

Fadous agreed, saying that the gowns would ‘naturally’ be tailored to the tastes of conservative clients. In fact, Saudi and Kuwaiti princesses, who have enough cash to buy $100,000 plus dresses common in the Lebanese couture are among the most valued clients and, in effect, the lifeblood of the industry.

You can find more of Appolo’s work at his website where the slogan is “Our design is an inspiration of Us”