If you’re a true fashionista or fashion snob, try not to retort with What kind of a dumb question is that? You have to realize you’re among a definite minority in the population.

Recently, I started learning about dresses, their designs and designers and such, mostly starting through Pinterest (some I’ve like so far). Not knowing anything, really, about the matter, trends in what I liked started to pop out. They tended to be either time period of the dresses, by which many Pinteresters organized their fashions, or designers that many Pinteresters noted in their comments on each pin. I’ll write about period fashion some other time, but for now, I want to focus on a designer whose name I kept seeing come up repeatedly in my viewing of dresses, and that is Zuhair Murad.

I would have to say that of all the designers whose work I’ve seen identified so far on Pinterest, I’ve been most impressed with Zuhair Murad’s. I’ve been through over 10,000 dresses now so I have a fair “sampling”, if you will, even if most did not have a designer name attached to them, being period pieces from antiquity to the 60s, for periods. While I have not been much into fashion, I do know of many designers, like Yves Saint-Laurent, Karl Lagerfeld, Elie Saab, Donna Karan, Valentino, etc. But I had never even once heard of Zuhair Murad, so that led me on to my investigation and writing of this article to share with others.

In my research, it seems as though not a lot of people have heard of Zuhair Murad, or know much of him, either. He doesn’t even have half a complete Wikipedia entry! That might sound like a ridiculous standard for fame, but seriously, I’m an analyst. I know this meaningful indicator sort of stuff, OK? That “relative anonymity” is what is led me to write this post, to share with many people I know who won’t have heard of Zuhair Murad nor seen his work, or at least know they’ve seen it.

From the Wikipedia entry, my favourite part is that he was, and possibly still is, based out of Beirut, Lebanon. It is one of many examples of beauty blooming from the city’s recent turbulent past, and sometimes still turbulent present. I love it when extreme beauty is found among adversity where it seems it cannot, or would be very challenged, to exist. My second favourite part is that his fashion have recently (since 2009) been worn by some of my favourite entertainment stars, including Taylor Swift. I don’t know about you, but I love it when my favourite entertainment stars, who are also among the people I think the most beautiful, are dressed in fashion I love seeing on anybody! Now, if only Anne Hathaway would appear in a sexy Zuhair Murad gown one day! It’ll be even better than her in Catwoman outfit! Anne, get thee talking to Kristen Stewart, who seems to love Zuhair Murad’s gowns, too. Kristen looks great in them, too!

But yes, there isn’t much written on Zuhair, so I’ll have to spend time finding out more, someday. Even his website is limited on information about him, apparently. It’s more of a sales site, though his haute couture lines, his best in my opinion, isn’t even on there! It’s like the guy works for the secret service on the side or something… but let’s not go there with the jokes. This profile is reasonably good, too.

So where can you see some of the best collection of Zuhair Murad’s work if not even on his website? Well, Pinterest provides many! I only have a Dresses board that has Zuhair Murad’s garments identified, and only a bunch as I have been very picky with what I’ve pinned to keep things “under control”. I pin only about 1-1.5% of the dresses I’ve viewed, to give you an idea of my standards, though that’s not to say they’re all the most glamorous dresses. My style sometimes include the very simple. If I haven’t been so tough thus far in my dresses pinning on Pinterest, a fair share of Zuhair Murad’s entire collection of dresses would be on that board, to give you an idea of how much I like Zuhair Murad’s work! You may also want to head over to his website to see some of his shoes and jewelry which I have not explored much yet, if you like shoes and/or jewelry.

Before I finish, I suppose I should say what it is I love about Zuhair Murad’s work in his dresses. At a high level, they’re very sexy. They really bring out the best in a woman’s form, whether with the lines, cuts, reveals, and such. I love how he tends to stick to one colour, or several, in radiant and/or sharp manners. I love how he uses lace that is very sexy and feminine, to enhance his designs. He also uses lace for flowers, rather than flower prints. The latter I tend not to like cause it looks like a mess from a distance. I like how he uses ruffles, and where he ploofs things up, he does it just enough for my tastes. But in all this, it’s the details he puts to his work. Just look at the details in most of the garments to know what I mean. They have a clean look to them that sometimes doesn’t show a lot of details at a glance, but closer examination shows plenty! An example of most of these features I like in Zuhair Murad’s dresses can be found in my favourite Zuhair Murad gown!

Do you like Zuhair Murad’s designs?