Friday March 29th, 2024
Download SceneNow app
Copied

Slow Fashion for Fab Feels at Zakeia

Determined to create one-of-a-kind pieces with sustainable practices, local brand Zakeia is bringing slow fashion to the fast lane.

Farah Ibrahim

Slow Fashion for Fab Feels at Zakeia

Before founding local fashion brand Zakeia, 24-year-old Sara Saad found herself at odds with the way she expressed herself through fashion after trotting through Germany, Japan, and then London for her studies. Inspired by the differences in street style she was exposed to, and conflicted by the harmful effects the fashion industry had on the environment, she decided to take matters into her own hands when she finally made her way back home to Cairo.


The fashion industry is the second largest polluting industry in the world, with fast fashion brands only adding fuel to the fire by underpaying workers in developing nations. “There are many ways to tackle sustainability,” Saad tells #CairoScene. “And I found the mix of reducing waste, and creating unique, one-of-a-kind or limited edition pieces with beautiful high quality fabric, really resonated with the message I wanted to deliver with Zakeia.”


The brand aims for timeless designs, rather than following trends. Manufacturing their pieces in a small rented studio, it takes Zakeia about one month to manufacture just 40 pieces. They don’t call it ‘slow fashion’ for nothing. But the reason it’s so time consuming is because they exclusively use sustainably-sourced fabrics and trimmings.


Due to the inconsistency of the fabrics, buttons, and ribbons that they source, Zakeia doesn’t create one unified collection per season. Instead, they create drops. Starting today and every Saturday moving forward, they plan on releasing a mini capsule drop on their website that lasts for an entire week. After a few months have passed, they look to gather all their unsold pieces for an archive week, so that no materials go to waste.


Zakeia has just launched today, March 13th, with their items available for immediate purchase. To shop, you can check out the link in their bio at @zakeia.store.