Fashion revolves around much more than fabric. For Mostafa Al Sous, founder and creative director of ATHR, it can carry memory, emotion and experiences people often struggle to put into words.
On 21 August, ATHR brought Our Families Between the Lines to Palestine House London for a special fashion show and fundraising evening, following the collection’s earlier presentation in Beirut. The event marked Al Sous’ first solo fashion show in London under ATHR, after previously presenting his collection BAWH in the city as part of Shubbak Festival through Creative Space Beirut.
But this was never simply about bringing a collection from one city to another.
At the heart of Our Families Between the Lines are personal stories gathered across Lebanon, Tunisia and London. These experiences became the starting point for the clothes, allowing individual memories and emotions to move across borders through fashion. As the collection travelled, so did the people behind it, their stories entering a new space and reaching a different audience.
ATHR was founded around the idea of turning human experience into something material. Through textile experimentation, craftsmanship and storytelling, Al Sous creates garments that retain traces of the memories and emotions from which they emerged.
With this collection, the focus turns toward family and the invisible layers that exist within those relationships. There are memories and connections, but also silences, emotional weight and experiences that remain unspoken. Our Families Between the Lines looks at exactly that space, the things that shape us even when they are never fully expressed.
Bringing the show to London allowed those conversations to expand. Rather than repeating its Beirut presentation, ATHR used the new setting to open the work to another community and continue conversations around family, identity, trauma, memory and healing.
That idea of healing also extends beyond the clothes themselves.
The London event was conceived as a fundraising fashion show, continuing ATHR’s approach to fashion as a space for dialogue and support. Through a collaboration with Mosaic, the project is providing mental health and psychosocial support to individuals who contributed their personal stories, with follow-up sessions intended to offer care after experiences that can be deeply sensitive to share.
It is an important distinction. The people behind the collection do not disappear once their stories be
come garments. Instead, ATHR is attempting to create a relationship between storytelling and responsibility, asking what happens after somebody gives part of their personal history to a creative project.
That progression also reflects Al Sous’ own work. His earlier collection BAWH dealt directly with trauma and emotional heaviness. Our Families Between the Lines begins from a different place, looking at what comes afterwards through ideas of healing, light and transformation, and questioning whether painful memories can eventually be carried differently.
In London, that evolution became especially visible. The show was not simply another international presentation, but a continuation of ATHR’s belief that fashion can preserve experience, connect people across borders and turn something deeply personal into a shared language.
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