Fashion

These Are the Arab Names on the BoF 500 This Year

BYMille Team

October 2, 2026

The BoF 500 is back, and the 2026 class comes with a strong Arab contingent. The annual index of the people shaping the global fashion industry has welcomed a new crop of designers, founders, actors, and behind-the-scenes power players, with several names from the region joining its ranks. From Saudi luxury and Kuwait’s growing fashion scene to Lebanese fashion education and the upper echelons of Parisian luxury, this year’s inductees show just how far Arab influence stretches across the industry. Here are the Arab names inducted into the BoF 500 in 2026, and why you should know them.

Yasmina El-Abd

At just 20, Yasmina El-Abd is already becoming one of the region’s most recognizable Gen Z faces. The Egyptian-Swiss actress started acting as a child before breaking through with roles in Finding Ola, Theodosia, and Daughters of Abdul-Rahman, building a career that moves easily between Arab and international screens. In 2026, fashion came calling in a major way when Dior named her an ambassador across fashion, beauty, and jewelry. Now, with a BoF 500 induction to her name, El-Abd’s résumé is growing almost as quickly as her front-row presence.

Shahd AlShehail

The Saudi entrepreneur co-founded fashion transparency platform Project JUST before launching Abadia with her aunt, Naeema AlShehail, bringing Saudi craft into a decidedly contemporary wardrobe. Working with techniques including Sadu weaving and Naqda embroidery, Abadia has since become the first Saudi label stocked by Net-a-Porter, with fans including Queen Rania and Alicia Keys.

Saif Mahdhi

You may not immediately recognize Saif Mahdhi, but you definitely know the careers he has helped shape. The French-Tunisian superagent has spent more than three decades behind some of fashion and pop culture’s biggest names, with a client history that includes Kate Moss, Anja Rubik, Saint Levant, Lana Del Rey, A$AP Rocky, and Imane Khelif. After rising through agencies including Viva and Marilyn and eventually becoming president of Next Model Management Europe, Mahdhi struck out on his own in 2019 to co-found Paris-based SAFE Management. His approach has long pushed against fashion’s old-school model-agent dynamic, favoring long-term career building and advocating for greater diversity, including more Arab representation within the industry.

Nadège Vanhée-Cybulski

Born in northern France to an Algerian Muslim mother and French Christian father, she cut her teeth at Maison Martin Margiela, worked under Phoebe Philo at Céline, and became design director at The Row before Hermès came calling. She took charge of the house’s women’s ready-to-wear in 2014 and has spent the past 12 years making Hermès clothes feel as covetable as the bags, sharpening its equestrian codes with sensual leather, exacting cuts, and an understated cool that rarely chases whatever fashion is obsessing over that week. For a designer who has largely avoided the industry’s cult of personality, landing on the BoF 500 is a pretty loud acknowledgment of her influence.

Sarah Hermez

The Lebanese-Armenian designer, who studied fashion design at Parsons alongside media and cultural studies at Eugene Lang, co-founded Creative Space Beirut with her former professor Caroline Simonelli in 2011. The nonprofit fashion school provides free design education to talent from underserved backgrounds, growing from a three-month pilot into a three-year program that has survived Lebanon’s financial crisis, the Beirut port explosion and repeated periods of instability. Hermez has kept the doors open through it all, making her 2026 BoF 500 induction recognition of a different kind of fashion influence,

Zainab Alabdulrazzaq

After becoming the first Kuwaiti fashion editor at Marie Claire Arabia in 2011, she launched 3oud.com in 2015, building the Arabic-language platform into a major voice for fashion and beauty in the Gulf. Her ambitions grew beyond publishing with Oud Fashion Talks, which she launched in 2022 to bring designers, retailers, creatives, and global industry heavyweights together in Kuwait.

These Are the Arab Names on the BoF 500 This Year

Nadège Vanhée-Cybulski

Related Stories

More From Fashion

Newsletter

The only newsletter you won't unsubscribe from

Follow Us