I’m as average as they come. For as long as I can remember, doctors have invariably concluded at my annual visit that my height and weight were within the fiftieth percentile. My childhood was average, equal parts idyllic play and monotonous suburban boredom. I went to an ordinary college and was awarded the layperson’s liberal arts degree. The catch? I also happen to be an Orthodox Jew.
Which means I abide by the laws of modesty: A set of rules dictating what one can and cannot wear. The basic laws are simple—cover the knees, the elbows, and the collarbone, and don’t wear anything skintight. Beyond that, I have the freedom to wear what I please. Clashing prints and colors so bright you have to squint to see properly? Check. Heels so high I struggle to keep my balance? Check. I have never considered my mode of dress to be strange, or that it somehow makes me a fundamentalist or a quack. Within my insular community, the way I dress is the norm, not the exception.
Then I went to college. For the first time, I was surrounded by people from all walks of life. Toward the end of my freshman year, as summer approached, I was thrust out of obscurity and into the role of human spectacle. As students traded their Uggs and oversize sweaters for cropped jean shorts and spaghetti-strap tank tops, my long-sleeve tops and knee-length denim skirts became increasingly conspicuous.
Still, I never felt embarrassed by what a classmate termed my “archaic devotion to overdressing.” In fact, I was proud of it. The more people stared and commented on my dressing habits, the more strident I became. As the temperatures crept toward a broiling 95 degrees, I may or may not have purposely added a thick wool top or fuzzy sweater to my look.
I first began tznius-fying (the Hebrew word for “modesty”) in high school. Specifically, at Roosevelt Field Mall on Long Island. Roaming the vast expanses of white linoleum one day, I happened to notice a blaring yellow “$5 Clearance!” sign hanging prominently in one window. The store, Rampage, was one of the more immodest in the mall: Its belly-baring tops and booty shorts suited girls going to the club far more than religious girls who feel uncomfortable showing even an inch of knee.
At that moment, it became a personal challenge to transform those clothes into outfits that were a tad more refined and infinitely more modest. And so the midriff-baring top was paired with a sedate, long-sleeve button-down. A red wrap blouse with draped, open sleeves was sewn to the elbow. An asymmetric floral miniskirt was paired with a pleated, stretchy, below-the-knee skirt.
I was not able to rely on the styling of the industry—on the catalogs and department stores pushing a certain look—so I wasn’t blindly buying items that I thought looked good. I was consciously buying items that I could make modest. As a result, I had to think deeply about the things I put on my body. To this day, if I see a miniskirt I like, I will look at its silhouette and design to see if it could be seamlessly layered with a longer skirt or dress underneath. A sleeveless dress will be transposed in my mind onto the dozens of long-sleeve options in my closet.
Fashion is cyclical, of course, and at times this helps Orthodox women stay ahead of the curve. Recently, the fashion wheel has settled on decidedly more modest trends. Last year, the midi skirt trend came back with a vengeance—both the voluminous, fifties-era, wide-skirted shape and the sleek, forties-esque pencil silhouette. The fashion crowd paired these ladylike lengths with demure midi block heels. In recent seasons, Valentino has sent long-sleeve gowns down the runway, beginning a trend that was previously a rarity in mainstream eveningwear. And just this week, The Row’s pre-fall show featured Orthodox-friendly looks. More and more, celebrities are strutting the red carpet in frocks that wouldn’t look out of place on the streets of devout Williamsburg. It’s as if the fashion industry has caught the modesty bug, and, at least for now, covered-up chic does not seem to be going away anytime soon.
Not coincidentally, Orthodox women and their relationship to fashion have received their share of media attention, as has the Chassidic fashion label Mimu Maxi, which creates modest clothes that are not just for the Orthodox consumer, and Orthodox stylist and fashion blogger Adi Heyman, who is dedicated to the laws of modesty but still manages to get photographed by top street-style photographers during Fashion Week.
These women demonstrate that abiding by the Jewish law of modesty need not translate to dowdy, unflattering, ill-fitting clothing. Modest dressing can be beautiful, attractive, and, most importantly, fashionable. My modesty does not prevent me from buying fashion-forward clothing. On the contrary, it is the reason I have a unique sense of style.
