mod markit

ZULFIYE TUFA IS WORKING TO BRING MODEST FASHION INTO THE MAINSTREAM.

When Zulfiye Tufa was a teenager, she’d often find herself in clothing stores for ‘mature women’. As a young Muslim woman looking for maxi skirts, the ‘mature’ section seemed like the only place she could find what she was after. “The thought is that the younger you are, the more beautiful you are, so you should expose and express that, not hide it,” she says. “That’s what mainstream fashion is usually about.”

While ever-changing sartorial trends saw sleeves and hemlines yo-yoing over the years, Zulfiye’s struggle to find youthful, stylish clothing that also ticked the modesty box endured. She began blogging and sharing her outfit customisation ideas online as The Hijab Stylist, and in the process, discovered a community of Australian women who shared her fashion frustrations.

So, in 2016, Zulfiye launched Mod Markit – an annual Melbourne pop-up market bringing together modest fashion businesses from outer suburbs and interstate, all in one central location. There are clothing swaps and secondhand stalls, plus some fun new add-ons introduced this year: a grand runway show, hijab tutorials, live art and spoken word performances.

“My goal has always been to make modest fashion more accessible – to work with women and make them feel like the best version of themselves,” Zulfiye says. “Mod Markit is for everyone, but I especially want Muslim women of colour to have a space where they can feel free and comfortable.” Practically speaking, that means having prayer rooms available, plus a place for mothers to breastfeed that isn’t the toilet – details that are often lacking in the mainstream shopping experience. On a deeper level, it meant thinking about how to build a space that connected the community.

Zulfiye originally pitched Mod Markit to an investor as an app, but was turned away with the critique that she lacked evidence of grassroots support. So, she set out to show there was real demand in the modest fashion space. And she succeeded. This year, there were 90 stallholders at Mod Markit, with nearly 2000 people in attendance.

Unlike in countries with a majority Muslim population, modest fashion makes up only a tiny portion of the Australian clothing market. But, thanks to small businesses across the country, things are slowly changing. “It’s actually insane how much the market here has grown,” Zulfiye says. “At one stage, you’d only be able to find one or two stores, mostly importing stock from overseas. Now, there are a lot more people starting clothing lines here to cater to our niche.”

At its core, Mod Markit is about giving women options. But for Zulfiye, it’s also a way to challenge the dominant narrative surrounding Muslims in Australia, and to show the diversity of dressing modestly. “In our community, there are people who cover more and some who cover less. You don’t have to wear a headscarf to dress modestly.” So, what exactly does it mean then? The answer, she says, is deeply personal. “I don’t like to define it for everyone because it’s a spectrum,” Zulfiye says. “For me, it’s about dressing in accordance with my faith, then beautifying and adding my own touch to that.”

Despite using it as her rallying cry, Zulfiye ultimately has mixed feelings about the term ‘modest fashion’. “You can open up any magazine and nearly always see someone dressed modestly,” she explains. “If a woman wears a suit, that’s quite modest. The reason I use the term is because I want to give us a platform that people can connect with, but the goal would be to have modest fashion considered as part of mainstream fashion. Because modest fashion is just fashion.”