Creator Spotlight: Samina Mailk

My faith is central to my work. As a Muslim woman, I see modesty not as a restriction, but as a powerful design language. It asks me to think more deeply about movement, proportion, coverage, elegance, confidence, and how a woman feels when she enters a room.

Culturally, I carry many worlds within me. My heritage connects me to Pakistan and India through family history and Partition, but I was raised largely in the West and shaped by decades of life across different countries. That gives my work a Western polish, South Asian depth, and a global spirit.

Through Malik & Wolff, I want to show that modest fashion can be bold, refined, joyful, and deeply modern. I also believe creatives have a role in showing communities what may be missing. Sometimes people don’t realize what they need until someone imagines it, creates it, and offers it with purpose.

I am especially proud of my Singapore Botanica collection. It began as an original print inspired by my years living in Singapore — the tropical gardens, vivid color, lush greenery, and the memories of a place that became part of my personal story.

The process started with my own artwork, which I developed into a print and then translated into dresses, kaftans, skirts, shirts, co-ord sets, and lifestyle pieces. What began as a memory became something women could wear, carry, and connect with.

It is meaningful because it represents so much of who I am: migration, motherhood, reinvention, beauty, gratitude, and global womanhood. It also reflects the future of Malik & Wolff — modest fashion that is not quiet or predictable, but expressive, elegant, original, and emotionally rooted.

For me, the collection proved that a print can be more than decoration. It can become a personal archive, a cultural bridge, and a story stitched into fabric.

I would love to imagine a collaboration between Malik & Wolff and a brand like Vivienne Westwood. Her work has always felt bold, rebellious, vibrant, and unapologetically expressive. I think bringing that creative energy into modest fashion would be incredibly exciting — mixing structure, print, drama, and covered silhouettes in a way that feels unexpected, intelligent, and powerful.

I would also love to collaborate with Melanie Elturk of Haute Hijab. Her journey resonates with me deeply because she was a Muslim woman who saw something missing in the community and had the courage to build it, even when the support and understanding were not fully there at the beginning.

I relate to that. My own journey has required courage — from choosing fashion over a more traditional path, to self-funding my education, to building Malik & Wolff with limited resources. I have always been a fighter. I think the most powerful collaborations happen when creative women recognize that same fire in one another.

One misconception I want to challenge is that modest fashion is plain, restrictive, or only for one type of woman. In reality, modest fashion can be expressive, artistic, elegant, bold, and deeply personal.

Another misconception is that luxury or high design only belongs to certain Western fashion houses. Beautiful craftsmanship, textile knowledge, tailoring, embroidery, and design intelligence have existed across South Asia, the Middle East, Africa, Southeast Asia, and many other regions for centuries.

What often gets overlooked is the creativity required in modest design. You are not simply covering the body; you are thinking about flow, dignity, silhouette, proportion, comfort, movement, and beauty. Modesty is not the absence of style. It is another powerful way of expressing it.

At Malik & Wolff, I want women to feel that they do not have to choose between faith, individuality, elegance, and fashion. They can have all of it.