Kotn's SS25 Campaign Reclaims the Art of Arab Leisure
Kotn's SS25 campaign doesn't posture or plead. It lives in the dust-light of afternoons, the split watermelon on a street-side chair, the heat-dazed nothingness of a summer too rich to explain. Shot by Dexter Navy, directed by Mariam El Gendy, styled by Zahra Asmail, and designed by Sarah Asmail, 'Stories of Nothingness from Everywhere' taps into a frequency few brands dare to tune into: the luxurious clarity of unhurried time.
Founded with a deceptively simple ambition - to create the perfect t-shirt without compromising people or planet - Kotn has sharpened its ethos into a full wardrobe. Certified B-Corp status, sustainable textiles, community investment: the brand's story is as finely woven as its fabrics. But SS25 pulls even deeper, excavating a cultural pulse that is both fiercely Arab and defiantly global.
"My summers back home felt full and impactful," says Rami Helali, Kotn's CEO and co-founder. "But when I tried to explain to my western friends what I did, I had nothing to report back. Long, sun-soaked days with friends, sitting around, doing nothing."
Helali paints scenes with the precision of someone who knows what Western timelines can't measure: "Spending 45 minutes arguing over a bill, with no worries about your next appointment, because generosity is more important than a schedule." The campaign leans into that logic. Abdallah Diab and Bader El Ramly, both artists in their own right, move languidly through frames - shirts undone, bodies loose - inhabiting a world where tea steeps in the scorch of summer.
Helali recalls bargaining with the fakahany (fruit vendor), only for a heated negotiation to end with a shared watermelon and a match on TV. "Fruit isn't only meant to be enjoyed after cutting on a perfect board in your aesthetic house," he says. That ethos - life as it is, not staged for consumption - breathes through the soft tailoring, the dust-muted palettes, the stitched ease of each piece.
Even a casual meet-up carries gravitational pull. "Going to meet your parents at the nady to say a quick hello, that turns into your whole group of friends joining your parents and their friends to sit around, drink juice, smoke shisha, and get roasted about how our team was doing that season," Helali remembers.
Kotn isn't selling a lifestyle but rather it's preserving one. The campaign is a quiet refusal of the hollow productivity that flattens human connection. It's a study in how ease can be a design principle, how being two hours late is not delinquency but rhythm.
"It's these moments of nothing, of leisure, that make us the richest people in the world," Helali says. SS25 doesn't merely capture that sentiment - it clothes it, houses it, hands it back without apology. Not a dreamscape, but a memoryscape.
Kotn's 'Stories of Nothingness from Everywhere' proves that in a world of endless motion, stillness is a power move.
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Al-Ahram Weekly
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Ziad Rahbani (1956-2025): An endless legacy - Culture - Al-Ahram Weekly
Few artists have shaped the cultural and political fabric of the Arab world quite like Ziad Rahbani, and his passing on 26 July registered among millions as a significant loss for the region's cultural heritage. A multi-talented composer, playwright and pianist as well as an outspoken political commentator, Ziad Rahbani was born in 1956 in Lebanon, in a home already marked by artistic greatness. The son of the legendary singer Fairuz (Nouhad Haddad), who turned 90 last year, and the late composer Assi Rahbani (1923–1986), Ziad inherited more than immense musical talent, he also absorbed an intense sensitivity, a sharp intellect, a critical eye, and a fearless voice for political dissent. His upbringing was steeped in the creative atmosphere shaped by the Rahbani Brothers — Assi and his brother Mansour Rahbani (1925–2009) — visionary composers from the town of Antelias, north of Beirut. Their legacy offered young Ziad not just influence and mentorship, but direct exposure to the intersection of music, theatre, and political thought from a staggeringly early age. No wonder Ziad started writing music so young; his first well-known public composition was Saalouni El-Nass (1973), performed by his mother Fairuz. From his early boundary-pushing, jazz-infused compositions to his provocative musical theatre, Rahbani emerged as the defining figure of a genre he referred to as 'Oriental jazz.' While he wasn't the first to use the label, his music transcended such classifications, fusing Eastern melodies and Lebanese folklore with Western structures in a way that was unmistakably his own. In doing so, he crafted a soundscape that was both rooted in tradition and daringly original. Rahbani's art defies creative perceptions and questions musical canons while his lyrics confront societal norms, all along capturing the pulse of Lebanese life during times of war, instability, change. Revolutionary and boldly visionary, he was also a romantic, with both qualities obvious throughout his creative life. Yet Rahbani was not so much a contradictory man but a deeply complex artist who carried within him a tangle of emotions: love and anger, clarity and confusion, tenderness and rebellion. He didn't resolve these tensions; he lived them, fully and unapologetically, channelling each into his music, theatre, writing. His work became a mirror of his inner world and the world that surrounded him; his creative voice was at times raw, at times refined, but always honest. His softer side shines through many of his songs. Who can find a more haunting and poetic piece than his over six-minute-long, slow-paced ballad Wahdon (On Their Own, 1979)? Performed by Fairuz, this meditation on solitude, memory, and loss, uses piano as protagonist, playing at the backdrop of a delicate fusion of Arabic music and jazz-influenced harmonic progressions. Is there anything more tender than Bala Wala Chi, an anthem of unconditional love so profoundly heartfelt in tone? Written with vulnerability and a quiet kind of longing, its music blends soft piano, jazz, and a minimal arrangement, to highlight the emotional weight. The song comes from Rahbani's iconic Houdou Nisbi (1985), an album that also features Khalas (It's Over), a soft adieu to love, wrapped in a ballad that drifts on soft airs of thoughtful jazz and Latin rhythms — his hallmark palette. Then there is Kifak Inta (How Are You, 1991), another emotionally charged classic among Fairuz's staple hits. While it may sound like a simple nostalgic air, many interpret its lyrics as an expression of Fairuz's pain over her son's departure. Who better than Rahbani to capture those feelings with such emotional subtlety and carefully measured lyricism? But the deeply melancholic face was just one of many facets of this profound artist. Rahbani was known for navigating the political turmoil, becoming the voice of resistance. Through the 1970s and 1980s his radio programmes were hugely influential in Lebanese culture, resonating with listeners trapped in Civil War, as he provided sharp commentary and reflection. Along parallel lines, many of Rahbani's compositions — particularly musical theatre, a form he wholly inhabited as playwright, composer, and lyricist — endure as profound reflections of his deeply rooted socio-political convictions. His reliance on Lebanese dialect was groundbreaking in making his work accessible and politically charged. In his Brechtian musical theatre, Rahbani made his voice unmistakably heard through works such as Sahriyya (An Evening's Celebration, 1973), Nuzl El-Surour (Happiness Hotel, 1974), and Bennesbeh Labokra Chou? (As for Tomorrow, What?, 1978) — the latter including eponymous music that joins jazz with Arabic and bossa rhythms. All those works were created before he had even seen his 22nd spring, and they earned him recognition, especially among his peers, a generation deeply affected by the unrest and violence of war. Far more than artistic expressions, Lebanon heard the voice of a young man full of hope, fighting for change, shedding light on the war, sectarianism, the devastation caused by conflict, political corruption, authoritarian regimes, but also the evils of capitalism, hypocrisy, neglect of the marginalised, and class disparity. His alternative, socially grounded theatre turned into a powerful critique of Lebanese civil society. In doing so, Rahbani transformed music and theatre, as he experimented with genres and forms. He courted sarcasm and a deep sense of irony intertwined with absurdism, factors that gave birth to the Rahbani style of theatre. One of that performance genre's poignant examples is Film Ameriki Tawil (A Long American Film), a play that premiered at Beirut's iconic Piccadilly Theatre in 1980. Set in a psychiatric institution in West Beirut, the play is filled with paradoxical dialogues echoing Beckett and Ionesco, with the characters trapped in the country's chaos. Two addicts, a disillusioned leftist intellectual, a nationalist, a war-time maniac militiaman, a man obsessed with uncovering 'foreign conspiracies', another fearing sectarian divisions, are among the characters who mirror Lebanon's fractured and dysfunctional post-war society. 'The events depicted in this play take place in October 1980 or October 1979 or October 1978, given that the overall political situation has generally remained unchanged.' So Rahbani commented on Film Ameriki Tawil years after its premiere. How prophetic this statement becomes when we realise that, in many ways, it is still valid nearly half a century later. The revolutionary or rather humane Rahbani continued to use his talent, in music and playwriting, to voice his views. The years to come were to see Shi Fashil (Failure, 1983) together with several changes including severe personal turmoil that only compelled Rahbani into detachment. He returned with Bikhsous Al-Karameh Wal-Shaab Al-Aaneed (On Dignity and Stubborn People, 1993), and Loula Fis'het Al-Amal (Little Hope, 1994). It was a time of a more nuanced exploration of alienation, existential doubt and the human cost of enduring conflict. The sarcasm and theatrical absurdity that once defined his plays could no longer be seen as artistic exaggerations; they had become accurate, even understated, reflections on the absurdity of the human systems he opposed. It was a time when the volatile years of a young man influenced by Marxism, his alignment with the Lebanese Communist Party (LCP), began slowly shifting towards disillusionment as he became increasingly critical of the ideological dogmatism that characterised the Lebanese and Arab left. As time passed, themes of existential introspection and isolation began to permeate his creative work. His musical journey also greatly benefitted from this personal development. If it was not for this journey, we would not have had Ila Assi (For Assi), released in 1995, an album which Ziad Rahbani created as a tribute to his father, the renowned Lebanese composer Assi Rahbani. In it, Ziad breathes new life into 18 classic songs composed by the Rahbani brothers, many performed by Fairuz. Undeniably, this work is among the greatest testimonies to the artistic legacies and personal lives of his father, who passed away in 1986 (after a 1972 stroke that marred the rest of his life), and to the whole family. Ila Assi is also one of the clear bridges that Ziad created between the golden era of his parents' generation and contemporary Lebanese music and social commentary, and one of his countless musical collaborations with his mother. Equally, Fairuz's albums Wahdon (On Their Own, 1979) and Maarifti Feek (1987) are among the greatest examples of the mother-son duo, where the Lebanese icon is artistically revitalised by her son's innovative vision, always marking a transformative chapter in both their journeys. 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Un verre chez nous (A Drink at Our Place), and Mish Bass Talfinly (It's Not Enough to Just Call Me) are undeniably the album's highlights, with the first being a French chanson toying with relaxed groove, the latter embedded in bossa nova. He paid another powerful tribute to his mother with Eh Fi Amal (Yes, There Is Hope, 2010), Fairuz's 99th studio album. Receiving both critical acclaim and commercial success, the album became especially important for both artists. With this work, the Lebanese icon reaffirmed her status as a musical legend, while for Rahbani, it highlighted the significance of his collaboration with his mother. It is a work that echoes themes of family, memory and personal history, beautifully capturing their intertwined lives. Though in recent years Rahbani stepped out of the public spotlight for the most part, whenever he reappeared at occasional performances on regional stages, curated jazz sessions and festivals (including in Egypt), he always mesmerised his listeners. Ziad Rahbani was a man wholly consumed by his passion for art. His sharp satire often made audiences laugh, his music soothed listeners while awakening their souls. To him laughter was a form of survival, but never an escape. His music was an extension of his being human. Whether navigating writing, composing, arrangements or theatre, there was one thing at his core: He lived through creation. Maybe like Beckett's Vladimir and Estragon, Rahbani quietly hoped for Godot to arrive, for the meaning, and while doing so, he left behind a legacy of profound awareness translated into art. Rahbani's influence runs deep through the work of countless Arab artists who both honour and expand his legacy. From Lebanese musicians like Mashrou' Leila, Yasmine Hamdan, Tania Saleh and Zeid Hamdan, to theatre-makers such as Rabih Mroué — whose work grapples with war, media, and memory — and the politically engaged Zoukak Theatre Company, Rahbani's spirit of artistic defiance and innovation lives on. Equally, it moves beyond Lebanon and enters the souls of artists from Egypt and other Arab countries. As Tania Saleh commented to the media, 'I believe it started with him, because he was already independent — of his family, of the Lebanese music scene, and even of the larger Arab world. His influences came from everywhere. He was a true first.' Rahbani's legacy transcends generations, echoing through today's traditional Arab works, the indie scene, underground hip-hop and theatrical experiments. His music is still performed, his lyrics memorised by heart, his sharp wit and emotional honesty inspiring artists across disciplines. For many, Rahbani remains a blueprint: blending Arabic music and folklore with jazz, political critique with poetic intimacy, and theatre with activism. His body of work is not only culturally essential, it is an open-ended legacy: uncannily relevant and unsettling as well as urgently alive. * A version of this article appears in print in the 6 August, 2025 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly Follow us on: Facebook Instagram Whatsapp Short link:
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