Husa people have always stood out from other Nigerians with their fashion style, culture, and food. Unlike most ethnic groups, even contemporary hausa dressing is mostly dictated by tradition and not global trends. Keep watching if you want to see more about hausa clothing style.
Let’s talk about the traditional Attire.
The Hausa tribe’s uniqueness goes far beyond its language. Among all the West African tribes, it probably wields the most significant number of unique characteristics that aren’t common to anyone else. The Hausa belief system, their clothing style, food recipes, and even the wedding ceremony are all fascinating and have been existing for hundreds of years. Unlike other Nigerian fashion styles, it’s essential for the hausas to have their women wear proper, yet elegant, attires that don’t show up their skin. When in public, a female has to be completely covered to avoid any judgmental looks. This is due to the fact that the Northern Nigerian hausa population consists mainly of muslims. Thus, their religion dictates their approach to clothing.
The men’s traditional attire includes unique attires called Babban Riga that are commonly paired with jallabia and juanni robes. The majority of the male population also wears color-rich hats known as hula that vary from person to person depending on the region they live in. The central decorations of men’s clothing are the various kinds of embroidery ornaments, with gold being the favorite.
A hausa woman can be easily recognized outdoors because of the colorful outfit that are called doguwar riga. However, that doesn’t mean that all hausa tribe people look alike. In terms of color and embroidery choices, you can see that tailors come up with hundreds of exciting designs. Such include riga da zani, riga da skirt, and doguwar riga as a classic. Hausa traditional attires have something to offer every taste.
What makes female hausa dressing even more unique is the fact that they are also highlighted by the use of beautiful, authentic jewelry, various ornaments, and body paint art such as henna which is called lalle. The decorations can be either traditional or tribal images that are mostly done in the facial region or henna drawings that are used both as makeup and to add beauty to a woman’s hands. As you can see in the picture above, the floral abstract patterns enhance the bride’s look immensely.
Female hausa attire includes dresses in the mermaid style, which adds elegance to the lady’s figure, matching turbans, and a long veil that complements the beauty of the wearer. Professional designers do their best to come up with both trendy and historically-accurate attires.
However, seeing as we live in the 21st century, a lot of hausa women opt for more fashionable styles that aren’t strictly adhering to the traditional dressing code. They opt for more classy and modern looks, but they still want to add some of the hausa flair of traditional elements to their fashion style. Luckily for them, there are hundreds of choices available that can change the attire with a single detail. These days, Northern women wear all the traditional pieces of a Hausa dressing, but both the fabric and the azure color, ooze a contemporary vibe.
The majority of casual hausa dresses nowadays are very similar to the Ankara fashion sensation. They come with radiant patterns and colorful prints that always gets loads of attention to the wearer wherever she goes. If you want to try one out for yourself, just pick a hausa-styled dress and wear it to the next event you’ll go to. You are sure to catch dozens of jealous glances.
BY: UMMU KHULTHUM ABDULKADIR
