‘Beauty alone has no meaning’: Kurdish fashion designer Lara Dizeyee plans third show

SULAYMANIYAH — The Kurdish designer Lara Dizeyee is working on new designs rooted in Kurdish culture but will wait another year or two before mounting a third show, saying she wants the next one to carry weight as well as beauty.

“I want my third show to be very rich and very deep, because beauty alone has no meaning,” she told 964media. “Beauty and depth together endure, but beauty alone is temporary.” She has plans for a good deal of new work, she said, but does not want to discuss the details yet: “I will talk about them when the time comes.”

Dizeyee launched her label in 2023 and was the first Kurdish designer to present a heritage collection at Paris Fashion Week that year. Her Milan Enchanted collection, 30 looks shown at the Palazzo Serbelloni, followed in September last year.

She researches each design before starting work on it. “I do my work from the heart, with love. Before I work on any new design, I do a lot of research on it,” she said. “I feel that when you work with a pure heart and put your mind into the details of your work, you also draw foreigners’ attention to your culture and to your brand.”

Her father, the singer Homer Dizeyee, is part of it. “My designs contain a lot of my own feelings, but undoubtedly they also contain my father’s feelings because I often listen to my father’s songs while designing,” she said. “I love his songs. I do it with feeling myself, and that is why other people feel it too.” He tells her, “Well done, my daughter.”

Her work uses the colours of the Kurdistan flag, elements of the Erbil Citadel, figures of Kurdish women and the flames of Newroz. The clothes she wore during the interview were her own. Most pieces from her previous collections have sold, to Kurdish, Arab, American and European buyers. “I am very happy that I have received very good comments and reactions from people because they have written very nice things to me, and I am happy that they continue to support me,” she said. Her previous collections include Milan Fashion Week 2025-26 and Paris Fashion Week 2023-24.

She would like to design menswear. “I am often asked to design men’s clothing as well, but so far I haven’t had the time,” she said. “I hope I get the opportunity to do it in the future.”

Dizeyee was born in Vienna to a Kurdish family from Erbil and raised in the United States. She has a degree in international relations from George Mason University and has spent the last 15 years in Erbil.