10 January 2018
The first few articles of clothing Nzinga Knight designed were strictly for herself. She had a wedding to attend and couldn’t find something to wear that she found both fashionable and modest, in keeping with her Muslim faith. So she designed her own gown.
Fast forward a few years and she is now the proprietor of her own Brooklyn-based fashion line, Nzinga Knight New York, which has shipped its high-end apparel to retail stores and e-commerce customers in more than 30 countries. In 2014, Knight was the first contestant on the design-focused reality show Project Runway to wear a hijab, the head covering worn by many Muslim women.
Knight has found a promising business at the intersection of style and Muslim culture, where women seeking to be both modest and elegant had few satisfying choices. Knight’s look draws on tradition, but with a contemporary sensibility. “I’m interested in not only having a sense of what I want as a designer, but also having a sense of what’s in the air and what is socially, culturally and emotionally relevant for people,” Knight said in a Brooklyn café near her Clinton Hill studio on a chilly December morning.
Read the full article at The Bridge
Photo by Katie Warren