*Originally published in Vogue Arabia, March 2026. [Read the original →](https://blog.osaythelabel.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/vogue-arabia-osay-march-2026.pdf)*
New York does not cushion you. It demands alertness, resilience, and the willingness to show up and hold your ground. But sometimes, if you’re paying attention, it also gives you back something you didn’t know you’d lost.
## Parallel lives
Simone and I had known each other since high school. We arrived in New York separately, following parallel lives — she in retail and hospitality, me in fashion and modelling. The city asked different things of each of us, and we answered differently. But underneath, the frustration was the same: something was missing. Something cosmopolitan, sophisticated, rooted — the kind of work that carried the weight of heritage and the lightness of beauty at once. Artisan craft that deserved to be in every room but wasn’t in any of them.
## A reunion at L’Alliance Française
We reconnected at a Tunisian cultural festival she was hosting at L’Alliance Française. I walked in and found her there, in a room that already felt like home. We started talking the way you do when you’ve been thinking the same thing for years without knowing it. The values aligned. The frustration aligned. And slowly, the idea did too.
## OSAY was born here
OSAY was born here. Not in Tunisia, not in a factory, not on a mood board — but in New York, in a city that is the most cosmopolitan place on earth, and somehow had no room yet for the sophistication of what our artisans were making. We thought: *if not here, where? If not now, when?*
New York is where belonging is built, not inherited. We built ours — one conversation, one shoe, one artisan at a time.
*This essay first appeared in [Vogue Arabia](https://blog.osaythelabel.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/vogue-arabia-osay-march-2026.pdf), March 2026.*
## Walk with us
The shoes are still here. Still made by the artisans we set out to honor. Still handcrafted in Tunisia, designed for every room you walk into.
**[→ Discover OSAY](https://osaythelabel.com/)**
With love,
Kenza
