Azza Slimene in Fashion Lift Off by Kristian Schuller for Harper's Bazaar Arabia

Tunisian model, actor, activist Azza Slimene — the youngest of eight girls in her family — covers the March issue of Harper’s Bazaar Arabia, having wrestled with a heavy hot air balloon in Antonio Grimaldi gowns, complemented by stacks of Cartier jewelry, on location in Dubai’s desert heat.

Photographer Kristian Schuller [IG] captures Slimene, styled by Anna Castan in Fendi, ITMFL, Valentino and more./ Makeup by Manuel Losada; hair by Adam Garland; art direction by Oscar Yanez

Azza connected with fashion legend Azzedine Alaia just months before his death in November 2017. In a rather dazzling life experience the designer invited her to stay at his Paris atelier and home.

“I met him by chance in Tunisia and he put some pressure on Next,” she [Azza] remembers in the Harper’s Arabia interview. “He said ‘you need to do a contract for her. I need her in Paris’, so they did the contract in two days. I’d been waiting months before that.”

It was the big break that Azza had been waiting for. “I’d never taken a plane, never travelled abroad before and I was going directly to Azzedine Alaïa’s place because he wanted me to be his muse, to make his clothes on me,” she explains, still bewildered. “He wanted me to stay at his place. He only did this with Naomi Campbell before me. He did a room for me and said ‘you’re my prodigy’, called me a ‘belle plante’ (gorgeous specimen).”

Naomi arrived shortly for an interview with the failing-health Azzedine, an event that the wide-eyed Azza watched during the three days she spent with the designer. Sadly, when the model returned to Tunisia to back more suitcases, Azzedine Alaïa passed.

Read on about this vibrant young woman Azza Slimene embarking on a high-voltage life journey at Harper’s Bazaar Arabia.