In France, the Muslim swimwear has become a trigger point, a symbol of fraught racial, religious and cultural divides. This week, three French resort towns, including Cannes, banned the Burkini from their beaches. The offending garment, said the Cannes mayor, fails to respect ‘good morals and secularism’. The Burkini first hit the headlines in 2011, when celebrity chef Nigella Lawson was photographed wearing one on an Australian beach, an incident dubbed by the tabloid press as ‘the great cover up’. Cut to March 2016: British retail giant, Marks and Spencers, decided to stock a Burkini line, drawing both praise and criticism. The target customers for this line were Britain’s large population of Muslim women, who want to shop for fully-covered, yet functional and fashionable clothing. This is the demographic which as the heart of the modest fashion movement.