Before you commit
A couture commission is a relationship, not a transaction. You will spend months and several fittings with this atelier, and the result is unrepeatable. It is worth a little diligence at the start. Here is what to ask — and what good answers sound like.
The seven questions
- 1. Do they design, or only reproduce? A true house creates from a blank page. If every gown looks like a catalogue order, it is production, not couture.
- 2. Will I have real fittings? Fit is built across fittings, in person. One measurement and a delivery is a warning sign.
- 3. Is the work one-of-one? Ask whether your design will be repeated for others. Exclusivity should be explicit.
- 4. Can I see finished work and interiors? The inside of a gown — seams, structure, finishing — tells you more than the outside.
- 5. Who actually does the work? Understand whether the house builds in its own atelier and who oversees your piece.
- 6. How is the price agreed? A serious house quotes in writing before work begins, with clear stages.
- 7. Do they ask about you? The right designer asks about your occasion, your life and how you want to feel — not just your size.
If a designer talks more about the dress than about you, you have your answer.
Trust your own read
Beyond the answers, notice how you are treated — the listening, the discretion, the seriousness. Couture is intimate work; the relationship should feel considered from the first message.
How HANIYE answers them
Every HANIYE gown is designed from a blank page, built through private fittings in the Al Quoz atelier, made one-of-one and numbered in the House Register, with the price agreed in writing before any work begins. Read the method on The Couture Process, or begin a conversation on WhatsApp.
