Doha, Qatar: M7, Qatar's leading epicentre for innovation and entrepreneurship in design, fashion, and technology, announced that it will host the 'Amazigh Hair Couture' exhibition from October 27, 2025, until January 12, 2026, which celebrates the artistry, heritage, and cultural symbolism of Amazigh hair traditions, specifically from Morocco.
The exhibition reclaims authorship of the aesthetic traditions of North Africa's Amazigh people, whose traditions are rooted primarily across Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, the Sahara, and Egypt's Siwa region.
Organized across four thematic zones - Roots and Rituals, Body and Soul, Reframing the Gaze, and Crafting Continuity - the exhibition explores how hair serves as a vital carrier of memory, beauty, resistance, and identity within matrilineal Amazigh cultures.
Drawing from a history stretching back thousands of years, the works on view span archival material contemporary practice, and highlight the resilience, creativity, and dignity embedded in these rituals, affirming hair as a medium of care, representation, and intergenerational legacy.
Commenting on this, Director of M7, Maha Ghanim Al Sulaiti said: "Amazigh Hair Couture Exhibition is a powerful celebration of identity and artistic expression, reflecting M7's mission to elevate diverse voices and connect regional talents with global audiences. We are proud to continue our partnership with Ilham Mestour and provide a platform for Arab and North African designers and artists such as Lalla Essaydi and Amina Agueznay to continue to champion and reclaim authorship over their narratives, sharing traditions in ways that are both contemporary and rooted in culture. This exhibition offers a compelling journey through time, inviting viewers to explore how traditional practices remain relevant in today's world."
The exhibition, led by Creative Director Ilham Mestour, a Moroccan-born, Netherlands-based artist and curated by Rajae El Mouhandiz, an interdisciplinary artist and curator based in Rotterdam, brings together fine art photography, scent, hair installations, textile works, and ethnographic archival material.
In turn, Creative Director and Hair Artist, Ilham Mestour said: "My work continues to pay homage to the women who came before me. Hair is not only beauty; it is lineage, it is strength, it is memory. Through this exhibition, I honour my Amazigh ancestry by transforming inherited rituals into my work globally, carrying forward the voices of the past. My collaboration with M7, from teaching in the Mastering Hair masterclass to presenting my work in this exhibition, enables me to continue to share these traditions and ensure they remain alive for future generations of creatives."
For her part, Curator Rajae El Mouhandiz said: "Amazigh Hair Couture is more than an exhibition; it is a tribute to the women who wove resistance into braids and encoded memory into form. By presenting hair as a living archive of memory, beauty, and resilience, we affirm the matrilineal traditions that have carried Amazigh identity across generations. Through a mixture of archival footage, visual art, a scent installation, and pieces from the Qatar Museums collection, the exhibition creates a dialogue between heritage and the present. It reframes these practices as both contemporary and timeless, reclaiming a visual language that has too often been appropriated, restoring it to its rightful context of dignity and creativity."
Celebrated artists such as Lalla Essaydi and Amina Agueznay will also participate in the exhibition, contributing to widening the dialogue around heritage, identity and contemporary expression. Together, these works trace Amazigh traditions within the broader cultural continuum of North Africa, showing how the past meets the present as designers reimagine tradition, heritage, and identity to create work that speaks to today.
"Amazigh Hair Couture" is organized as a legacy of the Qatar - Morocco 2024 Year of Culture, which was one of the initiative's most beloved celebrations, with a strong legacy of ongoing partnerships across heritage, creative economies, social and economic development and innovation.
Also on view at M7 will be "Houbara Haven: A Chaumet Tiara", an exhibition debuting the winning design from Qatari artist Aisha Alattiya, and "FTA: Threads of Impact", celebrating the seven year anniversary of Fashion Trust Arabia (FTA).
The M7 exhibition programme is part of Qatar Museums' 20th anniversary programming which is being celebrated under the banner of Evolution Nation, an 18-month campaign to honour the nation's cultural journey over the past 50 years. It is also part of the Qatar Creates Fall/Winter 2025 season.
