Iranian Women's Street Style: 20 Photos and the Story Behind Them

Search for photos of Iranian women and you will often find two opposite pictures: a black chador against a grey sky, or a bright scarf slipping off the back of the head on a busy Tehran street. Both are real. Iran is a country of about 90 million people, and how women dress there depends on age, city, class, family, personal belief and, since 1979, a law that makes covering the hair compulsory in public.

The twenty photos below come mostly from street-style projects and Instagram accounts that were popular in the mid-2010s, above all The Tehran Times street-style blog (not to be confused with the English-language daily newspaper of the same name). They show long open coats, patterned scarves worn loosely, sneakers, sunglasses and plenty of colour. They do not show "all Iranian women", and they were never meant to. Read them as a snapshot of urban, mostly young and often well-off women who chose to be photographed, and as a reminder that a dress code and a wardrobe are not the same thing.

Under each image you will find who shared it, what it shows and how it connects to the rules and trends that shape what women wear in Iran.

Why Iranian street style looks the way it does

Iran's dress rules have swung back and forth for almost a century. In 1936 Reza Shah issued the Kashf-e hijab decree, which banned the veil and sent police to remove women's headscarves. That forced unveiling was enforced for about five years and eased after he was deposed in 1941. After the 1979 revolution the pendulum swung the other way: Ayatollah Khomeini ordered women to observe Islamic dress, protests broke out on International Women's Day that March, and mandatory hijab was later written into law.

The official ideal is a loose, thick overcoat (the manteau) and a headscarf or chador in sober colours. In practice, many women in Tehran and other large cities pushed those limits for decades: shorter and slimmer coats, open kimono-style cuts, pastel or bright colours and scarves that cover less and less hair. That is the look you will see in most of the photos here.

The photos and the people behind them

1. A patterned coat on a Tehran side street

A woman in a long ethnic-print coat, plum scarf and electric-blue flats stands between rows of parked cars, with the Alborz foothills faintly visible behind. The same photo appears on the "Reality" side of the comparison image at the top of this page. Its original photographer is not named in the sources we could trace.

2. Colour at every age

Two portraits of an elderly woman wrapped in a white scarf covered in pink roses, with a riot of patterned fabrics underneath. Rural and tribal dress in Iran has always been colourful, which is easy to forget when only urban black chadors make the news. Credit: elliephotographyblog.

3. Blue on blue tiles

A long pale-blue coat, matching trousers and a rust-orange scarf, photographed against glazed tiles in deep blue and turquoise. Tilework like this is one of the signature crafts of Persian architecture, and street photographers in Iran use it as a natural backdrop. Credit: girlsstylebook.

4. A phone call in the garden

Black coat, slim black trousers, cream loafers and a large paisley scarf, the paisley (boteh) being a motif with deep roots in Persian textiles. The setting looks like one of Tehran's historic gardens or museum grounds. Credit: The Tehran Times.

5. Yoga in front of a Qajar-style tile panel

A woman holds a side-crow arm balance in front of a wall of painted tiles in yellow and blue. Yoga studios became popular in Iranian cities in the 2000s and 2010s, and the photo plays with the idea that modest dress and athletic movement do not exclude each other. Credit: The Tehran Times.

6. Lunch with friends

Three friends in mirrored sunglasses share a meal and a bright red drink in a café. Mixed groups of young men and women socialising in cafés are an everyday sight in central Tehran, even though the rules on public mixing are formally strict. The original credit for this picture is not given.

7. Grey scarf, silver shoes

A grey patterned scarf, cropped trousers and metallic flats on a sunny pavement by a brick wall, with an Iranian flag flying above. The monochrome palette shows that "fashionable" in Tehran does not always mean bright. Credit: The Tehran Times.

8. A loose scarf in a car selfie

A close-up selfie with a soft brown scarf draped far back on the head. This loose style, common among young women in big cities, was exactly what morality patrols targeted for years. Credit: sk.mode.

9. Butterflies and gingham

Two friends in oversized, open kimono-style coats, one grey with blue butterfly appliqués and one in black-and-white check. Loose, wide cuts like these technically meet the "loose manteau" rule while turning it into a fashion statement. Credit: @therichkidsoftehran.

10. A red coat and a designer bag

A three-panel shot of a long red coat, grey scarf, red ballet flats and a structured taupe handbag. Luxury bags were a frequent sight in these accounts, despite sanctions that made them harder and more expensive to import. Credit: The Tehran Times.

11. Linen and a leopard backpack

A sage-green linen tunic with rolled sleeves, sandals and a studded leopard-print backpack, shown from the front and back. Breathable linen is a practical choice in Tehran's hot, dry summers, when a full coat and scarf are a real burden. Credit: The Tehran Times.

12. A pastel suit in a café

A powder-pink suit, white sneakers and a monogrammed chain bag on a wooden table. The relaxed pose and mixed crowd in the background give a sense of how ordinary café culture is in northern Tehran. Credit: therichkidsoftehran.

13. Layers for winter

A long striped cardigan, patterned scarf, jeans and knee-high boots on a park path. Tehran sits at more than 1,000 metres and winters can be cold, so layering is part of everyday dress. Credit: therichkidsoftehran.

14. Black with fur trim

A long black coat with leopard and fur detailing, leather-look trousers, sunglasses and red lipstick, captured mid-stride on a city street. Dark colours remain the default for many women, but cut and trims make them anything but plain. The original credit is not given.

15. A green dress by an ivy wall

A moss-green dress, cream cardigan, white scarf and a fringed leather bag against a weathered wall with autumn ivy. The soft, bohemian look was popular on Iranian Instagram around 2016. Credit: The Tehran Times.

16. Café terrace, two moods

A waterfall-collar green coat with ripped black jeans and white sneakers, shown in two frames outside a café. Sneakers became a staple for young urban women in Iran, mixing global streetwear with the local dress code. Credit: The Tehran Times.

17. Black and yellow

Two women chat in a courtyard, one in a black coat with a leopard scarf, the other in a bright yellow embellished coat with a cobalt bag. Bold colour combinations like this one would have been rare on Tehran streets in the 1980s and 1990s. Credit: richkidsofiran.

18. Sunshine yellow

A yellow scarf, an embroidered sheer coat with daisy motifs and matching yellow flats on an autumn road. The watermark credits Ali Khan Photography; the image was shared by the account ir.streetstyle.

19. Modest fashion beyond Iran

A blush hijab, olive sweater, ripped jeans and a burgundy bag against a barn-style door. This photo is by Summer Albarcha, a Syrian-American modest-fashion blogger based in St. Louis, Missouri, so it is not from Iran at all. We keep it because it shows how hijab style has become a global fashion conversation.

20. Pink coat on the steps

A bubblegum-pink coat, black scarf, mirrored sunglasses and lace-up boots outside a glass office building. It is a confident, modern look that fits comfortably within a dress code while clearly expressing personal taste. Credit: mehrnoosh.sanee.

Who ran these accounts, and what they left out

Most of these pictures circulated through two kinds of sources. Street-style blogs such as The Tehran Times photographed women on the street and published them with a focus on clothes. Instagram accounts such as Rich Kids of Tehran, modelled on the American "Rich Kids of Instagram", showed the lifestyle of a wealthy young elite: cars, parties and designer labels. Iranian authorities blocked that account after it posted images of parties and revealing clothing; it was briefly shut down in 2014 and was blocked inside Iran by 2015.

That background matters. A gallery built from such sources over-represents affluent women in north Tehran. Women in smaller towns, in conservative families or in poorer neighbourhoods may dress very differently, sometimes by choice and sometimes not. Many Iranian women wear the chador or a full hijab out of conviction, and they are no less "modern" for it.

World Hijab Day, and the debate it sparks

Older versions of this story opened with World Hijab Day, which falls on 1 February. It was launched in 2013 by Nazma Khan, a Bangladeshi-American, to invite women of any faith to try wearing a hijab for a day and to push back against religious discrimination. It is now marked in many countries.

The day is also criticised, especially by Iranian and ex-Muslim activists. They point out that in Iran the question is not whether women may wear a hijab but whether they may take it off. In 2018 the activist Yasmine Mohammed started #NoHijabDay in response, to highlight women who resisted pressure to cover. Holding both views in mind is the honest position: freedom to wear and freedom not to wear are two sides of the same principle.

What has changed since these photos were taken

In December 2017 Vida Movahed stood on a utility box on Enghelab Street and waved her white headscarf on a stick. She was arrested, and the many women who copied her became known as the Girls of Revolution Street. In September 2022 Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Kurdish woman, died in custody after being arrested by the morality police over her hijab. Her death set off months of nationwide protests under the slogan "Woman, Life, Freedom", which were met with a violent crackdown.

Since then, a growing number of women, especially younger ones, have appeared in public without any headscarf at all. A stricter Hijab and Chastity bill was debated from 2023, and in 2024 President Masoud Pezeshkian said the morality police would no longer "bother" women over hijab, although enforcement has varied and penalties remain on the books. Seen in that light, the colourful outfits above look less like a fashion trend and more like one chapter in a long negotiation over who decides what women wear.

How to read a gallery like this

• Enjoy the clothes, but do not over-read them. A bright coat tells you about taste, not about someone's politics or faith.
• Check where photos come from. One image here turned out to be from the United States; viral galleries often mix sources.
• Avoid swapping one stereotype for another. "Oppressed and silent" and "secretly Western" are both too simple for millions of different lives.

For a closer look at the protest side of this story, see our related piece on Iranian women sharing photos with their hair uncovered, and for another photographer's view of everyday life, Magdalena Bagrianow's portraits from India.

Sources: Photos via Bored Panda, The Tehran Times street-style blog and the Instagram accounts credited under each image; earlier write-up by True Activist. Background: Wikipedia, Hijab in Iran; Wikipedia, World Hijab Day; Wikipedia, Rich Kids of Tehran; Wikipedia, Tehran Times (newspaper); St. Louis Magazine on Summer Albarcha.