Since she founded Niche Arabia in 2011, Marriam Najeeb Mossalli has become the leading voice for Saudi Arabia in the luxury consultancy field. After starting her career as a journalist, Mossalli is now an established name in the fashion industry, with Niche Arabia standing as the major consultancy firm specialising in luxury marketing in the Gulf Cooperation Council. Mossalli’s entrepreneurial company has been praised as a key player in elevating the global status of the Saudi Arabian fashion industry.
Born in Sri Lanka, Mossalli lived in Korea and Malaysia, before attending boarding school in Switzerland. She then moved to Washington and studied at The George Washington University, graduating with a major in Psychology and a minor in Film in 2007. She then established the “Life & Style” section in the English daily Arab News while working as a news journalist and features editor. Her writing contributions include various international titles, such as Harper's Bazaar Arabia, Esquire Middle East, Elle Arabia, and Marie Claire Arabia. She is contributing fashion editor for the Harper’s Bazaar Saudi and in 2022, she was recruited by the region’s largest publisher, Saudi Research and Marketing Group, as their in-house lifestyle advisor. In this role, she provides her business expertise to the publisher's portfolio of titles, such as Robb Report Arabia, Sayidaty and Hia — the largest Arab-language fashion magazine in the Middle East and formed the editorial team of the luxury travel magazine; List.
Today, Mossalli continues to write for international titles, including Harper’s Bazaar Arabia and Marie Claire Arabia, alongside her blog ShoesandDrama.com. She published a book on the disappearing crafts in the rural Saudi Arabian region of Asir and co-authored another called “Glamour Globals,” which scrutinises obsessions with material displays of wealth. Mossalli also conceived, curated and edited the book “Under The Abaya,” which features streetstyle images submitted by Saudi Arabian women. Only a week after posting about the book, she received over a thousand submissions.
Mossalli was the only Arab professional invited to the Celebration of Design Gala in 2015, hosted by the former First Lady of the United States, Michelle Obama. This cemented the entrepreneur’s status as a leader and ambassador for the regional fashion scene in the Middle East. Mossalli was also invited to the Cultrunners Public Storytelling Symposium, which was a joint venture between Art Jameel, Edge of Arabia and MIT’s Program in Art, Culture & Technology. In 2021, Arabian Business magazine hailed Mossalli as one of the 50 Most Influential Saudi Women in Business. Additionally, she is the co-founder of the e-commerce clean-beauty platform Powder Beauty and serves as the head of the Board of C-Suite Club, an entrepreneurial initiative dedicated to incubating and championing female start-ups in Saudi Arabia.
