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Hijabi Chosen in National CoverGirl Campaign

NEW YORK – A Denver-based Muslim beauty blogger has been chosen to feature in a national campaign, in the first time a cosmetics company show a woman in a hijab advertising its products.

“I grew up being insecure about wearing the hijab, and I never thought I would see Muslim women represented on such a large scale,” Nura Afia told Refinery29.

Afia, a practicing Muslim, will appear in commercials and on a billboard in New York City’s Times Square wearing a hijab while promoting one of the largest cosmetics companies in the US.

Afia is one of the only women to appear in an advertising campaign for a major cosmetics or fashion brand in the US while wearing a hijab.

“We’ve always stood for inclusive beauty that supports any and all types – from skin types to lash types,” CoverGirl said on Instagram.

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Starting her YouTube channel five years ago, Afia had 213,000 YouTube followers and 13 million views of her makeup tutorials, as well as a big following on such sites as Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and Snapchat.

The announcement that she was chosen as CoverGirl new ambassador, Afia was getting a lot of reactions.

“Just since the CoverGirl announcement yesterday I’ve had 20 emails from media like NBC,” she said in an interview with The Denver Post.

“Growing up, I felt it would hold me back,” she said. “You never saw women in magazines wearing one.”

For the Muslim woman, the new campaign is more than business.

“I feel like it shows girls that whatever you believe in, it doesn’t matter if you’re a Muslim or an Orthodox Jew, you can stick to your beliefs and pursue your dreams,” she said.

“I think it is so important that all different types of religions and races out there are represented.”

Islam sees hijab as an obligatory code of dress, not a religious symbol displaying one’s affiliations.

Muslims make up 1% of America’s 322 million population, according to Pew Research center.