BACKGROUND
Our Story
VELA was born in 2009 with the daring idea to revolutionize the way the world looked at hijab and modest style.
At 18, co-founder Marwa Atik identified a gap in the market and created the scarves she dreamed of wearing, developing one-of-a-kind designs and styling trends that quickly elevated the modest fashion scene. Along with her sister and co-founder Tasneem Atik Sabri, they took their background in business and design to establish VELA and pave the way for a new, creative vision for what modest fashion could look like.
Ten years later, VELA (latin for “veil”), is a globally recognized brand that focuses on creating the world's most comfortable scarves and generates a powerful community of women celebrating one another for their uniqueness and strength.
THE MAKING OF VELA
Our Process + Production
Designed in Southern California, hand-crafted in India.
All products are designed in-house by Marwa and her team; from our custom color curation to our airy, breathable fabric, we create scarves to serve and celebrate the VELA community. We work closely with cotton mills and a small, women-led team of artisans in southern India to cultivate our own one-of-a-kind fabrics.
We work in small batches to release capsule collections throughout the year and focus on community and sustainability each step of the process.
There's a reason why our scarves are so loved: we don’t compromise on quality or softness and there’s comfort from start and finish.
THE MAKING OF VELA
How we hand-dye
Our dye masters come from a tradition that is handed down from their forefathers, who perfected the science of hand-dyeing over generations.
We're honored to work with this kind of small-batch dyeing that supports small-business artisans who in turn support their own communities.
As part of our design and production process, we think deeply about color relationships and skin tones to develop dye colors that complement a range of skin tones across the VELA community.
Small batches, slow fashion, big love.
THE MAKING OF VELA
Our commitment to sustainability
Every element of developing our scarves is thoughtfully crafted with you, our planet and our artisans in mind.
We’re committed to sustainable, thoughtful production - our packaging is recyclable and we’re always exploring new ways to reduce waste in our production process, as we’ve done with our fabric up-cycled scrunchie line.
