Maketh the man: Elie Saab

Elie Saab glides into his Paris showroom, steps away from Avenue Montaigne and the Champs- Elysees, two days after his spring-summer 2014 haute-couture show. The Lebanese designer, wearing a neat black jumper and with pencil in hand, sits and begins to sketch.

“Honestly, I tell you something, couture will be for life. Where there is women, there will be couture,” says the self-taught “king of the red carpet”, who will turn 50 in July.

A third of all couture clients are now based in the Middle East, according to Reuters. Luckily for Saab, the first major fashion designer hailing from the region, many are loyal to him. Queen Rania of Jordan, for example, chose to wear Elie Saab for her enthronement, in 1999. Behind closed doors, Arab royalty and Middle Eastern high society wear him at weddings and VIP parties, gatherings at which it’d be a faux pas to be seen in anything twice.

Royals elsewhere, such as Victoria, Crown Princess of Sweden, Stephanie of Luxembourg and Charlotte Casiraghi, of Monaco, are also fans.

You’ll most likely see his work on the red carpet; the likes of Gwyneth Paltrow, Nicole Kidman, Zhang Ziyi and Fan Bingbing (who is “exquisite, so beautiful!” says Saab) having donned his gowns for the Cannes Film Festival, the Golden Globes and the Oscars.

Angelina Jolie stepped out in a shimmering, sequinned, floor-length gown of his for this year’s Academy Awards (and that Ellen DeGeneres selfie).