A high-performance hijab is being developed by Nike, the sportswear giant, for launch next year.
The Nike Pro Hijab is the result of what the company said in a statement was 'an ongoing cultural shift that has seen more women than ever embracing sport'.
Nike added: 'This movement first permeated international consciousness in 2012, when a hijabi runner took the global stage in London.'
That runner was Saudi Arabia's Sarah Attar, who helped to inspire the product along with the Emirati weightlifting Olympian Amna Al Haddad, according to the Religion News Service (RNS).
Al Haddad described to Nike at length the issues she had with existing athletic hijabs, including their weight, movement and lack of breathability.
Nike said its aim, therefore, was to create a lightweight hijab that was 'inconspicuous, almost like a second skin'.
Nike's design is now being used by some select Muslim women in the Persian Gulf region's competitive sports scene, RNS reported.
Last year, a report from Thomson Reuters found that Muslim consumers spent about $243 billion on clothing in 2015, around 11 percent of the total international spending on clothes.
Last month, the international casual clothing company Uniqlo launched a fourth collection in collaboration with the British designer Hana Tajima, a hijab-wearing Muslim.
Debenhams became the first major UK department store to sell hijabs after it recently announced a partnership with Aab, a Muslim fashion brand.
The high-end design label Dolce & Gabbana launched a line of hijabs and full-length abayas, and since DKNY produced a Ramadan collection in 2014, brands such as Mango, Tommy Hilfiger, Zara, Monique Lhuillier, Net-a-Porter and Oscar de la Renta have all done the same.
'It's not just about making a product available for Muslim and Arab women but it is also giving a chance to those women who are putting off the idea of wearing the veil completely in order to compete,' the Egyptian runner and mountaineer Manal Rostom told Al Arabiya English.
According to RNS, Nike's new pull-on head covering is designed with a single layer of durable mesh, which features small holes to increase airflow, while the back of the hijab is slightly longer, so it doesn't come untucked to uncover the neck.
The Emirati figure skater Zahra Lari, who has been testing these features in Nike's prototypes since early 2016, said: 'I was really hesitant when I first saw it...I've tried so many different hijabs for performance, and with how fast I spin on the ice and in training, so few of them actually work for me. But once I put it on and took it for a spin on the ice, I was blown away by the fit and the light weight.'
