The best just got better.

When we debuted our Ultimate Underscarves nearly three years ago, we put the best of our research, design and tech efforts into bringing you a collection of underscarves that hoped to tackle as many underscarf problems for hijab-wearing women as possible, in addition to beauty and comfort.

But, we are nothing if not attentive to our customers – your thoughts and your needs. We’ve been listening, recording and taking notes from all your feedback as well continuing our own research into other sustainable fabrics as they came on the market and design principles to better address tension, slippage, comfort and price point. You spoke, we listened! So let’s get into what it took to bring this next generation of our Ultimate Underscarves to you!

A Deeper Understanding of Fit and Fabric

“We started with an incredible foundation of underscarves,” says HH’s Associate Production Director Lily Steele. “What was groundbreaking about our first collection was how it fit on a woman’s head. But what remains an ongoing conversation and challenge is how do you design an underscarf that is ‘one size fits most?’ And, it took a lot of feedback over time to figure out how we could take that great first product and our customer experience and take it to the next level.”

The product and design team carefully studied fit and fabric, taking into account customer feedback about a variety of things. Over the past few years as the team has moved deeper into sustainability and fabric research, one of the tweaks they come up with was to take the ruching at the back of the Classic and Criss-Cross Underscarves and make it all out of the same eco-friendly Bamboo Jersey instead of using net material.

Lily says, “Our customers love the jersey so much, and there are really so many cool things this jersey does because of its antimicrobial properties.” Another main takeaway from customer comments was that some wanted to be able to wear the underscarf without a hijab in a pinch in certain situations, “which is why we decided to fully cover it in the back,” Lily says. “We wanted to make sure it looked cute and covered all of a woman’s hair on its own.”

The other ongoing challenge with any underscarf is fit feedback: How do we make sure this underscarf doesn’t slip on a wide variety of head shapes and face shapes?

A few months ago Lily and HH Production Analyst Elizabeth Walsh were discussing a Muslim woman’s on-the-go lifestyle, and how the fit of an HH underscarf needs to keep up with the movement. “I always think of Haneen [Gharbieh, HH Accounts Manager who keeps things moving in the Dallas warehouse],” Elizabeth said to Lily. “She is on her feet all day fulfilling orders, which requires a lot of reaching, bending and overall movement. How could we tweak our underscarves so that a woman like her can feel secure and comfortable?”

Arlene Severet, HH’s technical design consultant, says it’s important to understand that depending on where one’s ears fall on one’s face, the size and shape of a woman’s forehead and other measurements, an underscarf is sure to fit differently from one woman to the next. “Everyone is different with different lifestyles,” says Arlene. “One of the things that I concentrated on with the fit was opening up the seams by the ears a little. Before the seams went over a woman’s ears, and sometimes that caused stress.”

Criss-Cross Ultimate Underscarf in Sienna

Another tweak was to expand the ruching elasticity in the back so that if someone has longer hair or thicker hair, it would stretch further to comfortably hold it all. This is also supported by the natural give of the Bamboo Jersey fabric.

“From the beginning there was a thorough conversation about fabrics and the feedback that we got,” says Arlene.

“We’re customer-first,” Lily adds, saying “It makes it so easy to design for the customer because we got so much feedback from them.”

Another thing the team worked on was to work with their fabric and production vendors to adhere to measurement standards to ensure a good fit and “make sure the quality and workmanship is consistent,” Arlene says.

The next generation of our Ultimate Underscarves in Classic and Criss-Cross are offered now in six colors: Black, Ivory, Mink, Mushroom, Stone and Sienna (the latter three being new colors).

“Our Ultimate Underscarves are an incredible concept and product, and what we were able to do the second time around was primarily because of the skills of our technical designer based on how something fit before, and how we solve for that problem without creating another problem for someone else,” Lily says. “We are excited and proud of this capsule collection and are eager to hear what our community thinks!”