Rimsha Sayyed
The New York Fashion Week (started on September 7) is about to end, but we witnessed something very cool! The Hijab has taken centre stage on the New York Fashion runway as promising Indonesian designers kicked off an increasingly diverse fashion week, hoping to change prejudices in the west.
Dian Pelangi, age 26 with 4.8 million Instagram followers was one of five Indonesian designers who participated in the event. Pelangi designed her colouful clothes specifically for “affluent, modern, religiously observant Muslim women.” All of the models wore Hijabs with inside pieces that were inspired by medieval European fashion.
“We are not oppressed and we just want to show the world we can still be beautiful and stylish with our hijabs on.” – dianpelangi
Vivi Zubedi, age 30 and based in Jakarta, was the other designer who donned modest fashion on that first day as well. Zubedi choose to stick with a more traditional style of Abayas but added her own spin on the look, embroidering Arabic words and phrases onto the Abayas. She felt moved to come partly because of Donald Trump, who has sought to restrict immigration from certain Muslim majority countries.
“Mr President, I love your country and also I love your people, and we will not (do) anything to you or your people. We are all the same, it’s about humanity.” – Vivi Zubedi
Fashion Weeks have always been a place for designers to challenge and step out of the norms of society by using their creativity. Recently it has become a popular trend to make large political statements by using fashion to challenge society. Hijab, Abayas and modest fashion have seem to have taken centre stage in not only this year’s New York Fashion week but fashion weeks around the world!
