Keeping up with hijab chic

The first hijab I fell in love with was a large white cotton triangle bordered with three inches of dangling lace fringe. I tied the scarf in the only style that all truly cool hijabis were sporting: a twisty headband rolled on top, with a bandana underneath. The scarf was held together with safety pins, and most closely resembled my mom's lace curtains.

I looked gooooood. Like, 1990s big-hair good.

I strutted around in this getup for most of junior high school, before graduating to the second hijab style that was trending. This involved a rectangular scarf that was pinned up, leaving the long end to dangle behind your back.

I still looked goooooood.

This was hijab chic in the '90s. Those were simpler times. Back then the only places you could buy hijabs were small shops that also sold prayer beads, religious texts, exotic vegetables such as okra and bitter melon, and a few halal cows. It was your basic Walmart Supercentre for the newly immigrated set.

Then scarves became a must-have accessory in every girl's closet, and suddenly you could buy multicoloured wispy things at H&M, Zara, Old Navy and Ardene for as little as $5.

A scarf is an accessory, but a hijab is a lifestyle. In the old days, if your scarf matched your clothes, you were at the height of hijab fashion. Now the bar has been raised substantially, leaving me with zero game.

I turn to my uber-hip teenage nieces for a few tips. They talk about pinning here, prodding there. I look at them blankly and they point me towards YouTube.

A little bit of googling introduces me to a whole new world, where fashion-forward Muslim women — hijabinistas — are posting, Instagramming, and launching their own fashion empires.

There's Dina Tokio ^[1], sporting a "turban" hijab, who sells her curated stock at dinatorkia.com; U.K.-born hijabi fashion designer and blogger Hana Tajima, who teamed up with Japanese fast fashion retailer Uniqlo to launch her fashion line ^[2] in the summer of 2015. And there is @YaztheSpaz89 ^[3]— she has her own app for makeup tips and tutorials — and @Ascia_akf ^[4] who has 1.6 million followers. I'm pretty sure that's a lot.

I think I'm in the wrong profession.

A few weeks ago, Dolce & Gabbana launched a new collection of hijabs and abayahs ^[5] to tempt the haute-couture-bu ying modestly dressed demographic. A wise move, considering the untapped market of style-savvy Muslim women.

Clearly it's time to upgrade my look. I stand in front of the mirror and carefully follow YouTube videos — wrapping, tweaking, pouting. The result is more lopsided wedding cake than hijab. Also, my mom's voice whispers in my ear: "bhudi gori lall lagh-am" — an Urdu version of the "mutton dressed as lamb" aphorism.

I undo the wedding cake and stick to my usual style, circa 1999.

Forget the online tutorials — I'm ready to dig out my old be-laced white scarf and wave it at the hordes of well-dressed hijabinistas. I've done my duty, now it's their turn to champion the cause. Have at it ladies, and may the best dressed look fondly upon those who are too tired to care anymore.

For me, I'll be sticking to these five staple styles:

The triangle scarf: This is pinned under the chin or tied behind the neck. That's it. Nothing to see here. Moving right along.

The hijab "updo:" A rectangle scarf is pinned under the chin, the long end swirled around the head and then held in place with a brooch or pin. Fun fact — if you're ever in need of a safety pin, ask a hijabi. Chances are she has five of them, and another three in her purse for just such emergencies. I'm convinced the Muslim community keeps the pin barons in business.

The beehive: This style coincided with the "high bun" craze a few years ago. For a long time, I wondered how everyone got their high buns so perfectly round and Princess Leia-like, until I realized they all used those doughnut-shaped scrunchies. Hijabis use them too, except underneath their scarf, to get an impressive looking "hair bump."

Hijab bed-head: This is a loosely tied hijab that looks like it was just thrown on, but actually took 45 minutes of careful tweaking to get that perfectly mussed look.

The turban: Think glamorous 1920s movie star, complete with oversized sunglasses and matte red lipstick.

The colours, patterns, and types of hijab have no religious significance. They simply represent the wearer's style sense (or lack thereof). Hijabis make fashion mistakes too. My friends are still laughing at my failed 1996 attempt to tie a Nigerian bridal head tie. All photographic evidence has been destroyed to prevent blackmail.

Though after scrolling through a few dozen Instagram accounts, I think I was just ahead of my time.