Turkey’s Islamic Fashion Revolution

“Turkey’s Islamic Fashion Revolution”

By: Tim Arango

(Review by: Nor Safura bt Abdul Halim)

This article is about an Islamic fashion house that is now highly demanded in many of the countries including Russia,Eastern Europe,America, and many more. The modest fashion week was held in Istanbul, at an Ottoman-era railway station. The writer said that the Islamic fashion there is not dreary dress stereotyped in the West, but it is a colorful, creative and joyful enterprise. Other than that, the writer also include a few people that are related to Islamic fashion style such as Dina Torkia, a Muslim fashion blogger from London. She said that there are a lot of Muslim girls who wear the hijab, and they like fashion. She also said that the Islamic fashion industry is slowly taking over the fashion revolution which is the good opportunity for Muslim to expand and revealed the true way to dress modesty according to Shariah compliance.

Next is, the writer also write in his article about the issue in France which they tried to ban the burkini (a full-body swimsuit) as a symbol of the oppression of women. Then, he compared it with the Turkey that said, Islamic dress in Turkey has become a symbol of religious freedom from the strictures of secularism, and its government also encouraged the Muslim attires by chipped away at old taboos, allowing female officers, for the first time to wear head scarves on the job. Next, the writer also write that the powerful women in the region like Mr.Erdogan’s wife, Emine, and Sheika Mozah, a wife of a former emir of Qatar, have become fashion icons for young women out there. I think, this is one of the good way to attract young people especially women to wear Islamic attire and cover parts of their body as they can see from the examples that we also can be beautiful inside and out with covering our aurah, not revealed it.

In my opinion, it’s not wrong for a woman to dress fashionably or elegantly, as long as she follows the Islamic guideline. And I think, through this modest fashion week, it is a soft-approach or an eye opener for western people to get closer and to know more about Islamic way of dress-up as they can see it is a conservative fashion and they will realize it is beautiful, even if they are covered. Other than that, if we are wearing an attire that is Shariah compliance and cover our aurah, we will feel a lot safer and also especially protected from the men’s eyes, which also van avoid any harm or crime such as rape. This advantages promotes a secure way and attract both Muslim and non-Muslim to dress according to Shariah. It’s also like killing two birds with one stone which through this Islamic fashion also will attract people especially non-Muslim women about Islam, for an example, Felixia Yeap, in the beginning, she likes to see women wearing a headscarf until she experienced it herself, then she started to fall in love with Islam and and convert her religion to Islam. Before that, she was a sexy model, but now, she has continue to wear a proper Muslimah dress as she feel safer and calm. So, we can see from that experienced, a true proper Islamic attire can be an eye-opener for people out there about Islam. There is no difference between modest fashion and mainstream fashion. We just have to adjust some things, like the length and width. We shouldn’t see skin and it shouldn’t be tight. That’s it.