Styling coffee and performing taste: influencers' fashion and women-only social gatherings in the United Arab Emirates

Sharing Arabic coffee is a symbolic ritual of hospitality in the Persian Gulf, and in this chapter, coffee becomes a lens to examine how contemporary trends in coffee and sartorial fashion in the United Arab Emirates are performed in hospitality spaces and displayed in images shared on social media. The focus of this chapter is on young Emirati women influencers who post images of their personal fashion style and lifestyle tastes on Instagram. Using visual ethnography, this chapter explores themes built by the 'coffee-cup shot‘ in café locations, and the way in which drinking 'traditional‘ coffee is framed in images from home gatherings. The images investigated feature locally designed abayas accessorised by global luxury brands in coffee culture locations, and kaftans, which are styled by fashionable coffee utensils and worn to socialise at home. Drawing on the distinctions of taste and capital accumulation, the analysis of images, products and social practices situated within this cultural context considers how new meanings of fashion and coffee style are constructed through the influence of these imaging regimes.