Muslim Women Fashions: Chic Muslim Street Fashion

Chic Muslim Street Fashion

All women want to look good, and Muslim women are no exceptions to this rule. They like to shop for new clothes, look at style magazines, experiment with fabrics and designs. However, Muslim women do have to adhere to Islamic rules of dress - so certain things are ruled out like no mini-skirts, tight clothing, transparent fabrics.

But that does not stop young Muslim women from creating chic street looks of their own, inspired by the latest fashion trends.

Some of the latest fashion trends are emerging from Indonesia, take a read of a report on a recent fashion festival there:

The recent Islamic Fashion Festival at the Dharmawangsa in South Jakarta tried to prove the contrary that women could still look beautiful while maintaining modesty. And as predicted mainstays of Islamic fashion, loose long dresses, tunic shirts, long skirts and trousers, jodhpur pants and maxi-pantsuits are featured in the festival.

Designer Jeny Tjahjawati takes Makassar’s Sengkang silk ikat weaving for her inspiration. The colorful weaving of floral patterns is applied on white silk fabric that is usually worn as sarong.

“The fabric is made from stiff natural silk, so I used it in outer garments, like vests. For the inner garments, I used T-shirts printed with the pattern,” she said.

The festival also put a spotlight on designer Ghea Panggabean, who has been working in the industry for 30 years. Ghea uses embellishments and prints in her designs, consisting of long kaftans, kabayas, embroidered long jackets and jodhpur pants, all bearing batik patterns of Sumatra, Java and Bali.

While the theme of the festival is Islam, designers come from different backgrounds, Bali-based designer Milo and Malaysian designer Melinda Looi are both non-Muslims.

Festival committee chair Dato Raja Rezza Shah said he wanted the festival to reach out for non-Muslim so he invited non-Muslim designers to take part.

“We want to show that fashion can unite people and go beyond borders of culture and religion,” Rezza Shah said.

While the festival celebrates its 4th anniversary this year, Rezza Shah hopes it could highlight the allure of Islamic fashion to the world. He brought the festival to New York last month, and will go to Monte Carlo in August and make stops in Qatar and Singapore in September.

“Non-Muslim thinks that Muslim women should always wear black and that Islamic attire is a punishment for the women. They don’t know that it can also look chic,” he said.

He said that if the Islamic fashion could appeal the fashion senses of non-Muslims. He said that Islamic fashion was in fact good news for the industry. “One dress could use up to six meters of fabric,” he said.

“Actually, the headscarf will be a good solution for bad hair days. Women who do not have time to go to hairdresser can wear headscarves too,” he said.