As I’m sure you are already aware, London Fashion Week just came to a close. What you may not be aware of is that the city also played host to the smaller, newer, but arguably no less important London Modest Fashion Week over the same weekend. Now in its second year, the event aims to shake off the clichés that surround modest dressing by celebrating and showcasing modern modest designers from around the world. The stunning items on display might span from tailored colorful two-piece sets from Malaysia to full-length abayas from Saudi Arabia, and are largely taken in by a cool young crowd of stylish attendees.
Over the last few years, partly due to the impact of social media, the fashion world seems to have tuned into a “new” demographic: Muslim women and others for whom dressing conservatively is a religious or cultural choice. With the rise of models such as Halima Aden—who in 2016 drew attention for competing in a Miss USA pageant in a hijab and last year became the first hijabi model to be featured on the cover of Allure magazine—big brands have also cottoned on to this long underserved and underrepresented demographic. Nike has released a Nike Pro hijab, and L’Oréal Paris recruited hijabi beauty blogger Amena Khan as part of their latest shampoo campaign. Sensing an untapped consumer market, major labels have finally started to advertise and reach out to Muslim women and others who prefer to dress in a more modest manner.
At one runway show, I found myself sitting next to Sayra, an immaculately dressed teacher from Toronto who currently works in Dubai and had flown to London to check out the city’s modest fashion scene (the market has long been flourishing in the Middle East). She tells me that it’s become a lot easier over the last few years to snag modest everyday looks at high street shops, but covered-up occasion clothes remain harder to find. This is something I have come across myself when shopping for weddings of more conservative friends and family. The assumption that eveningwear must show a bit (or a lot) of flesh is ingrained in Western fashion, but Fatimah Mohsin’s collection of glamorous bejeweled gowns and two-pieces showed it to be far from necessary.
Suada Mohamoud, who works in PR and events for the modest fashion world, says that the goal is to ultimately change the perception of the word modest. “When people say ‘modest,’ they picture somebody wearing a big black scarf or abaya, and that’s just not what it is any more,” she says. Although that demographic is one that is (quite rightly) represented at the event, there is a huge variation on offer—modesty itself has a different meaning for everyone. “We use clothes to express ourselves, and we wear the same clothes everybody else wears—it’s just that we wear them a bit more conservatively,” Mohamoud says. “What we’re trying to move away from is the idea that you’re not just well-dressed for a hijabi, you’re just well-dressed.”
Rahemur Rahman, who is behind the creative direction of the event and a menswear designer in his own right, echoes this sentiment: “The aim is to get this to be part of London Fashion Week Festival and showcase international modest brands alongside everyone else. The bigger aim is that we will slowly stop calling it Modest Fashion and just call it fashion.” Looking around at a room filled with so many different styles, tastes, and trends, it’s hard to argue a case against such a, well, modest goal.
