Nawal Alsaeed

Nawal Alsaeed is the founder and CEO of Studious Monday, a Dearborn, Michigan-based fashion brand that creates sustainable, contemporary modest wear for women and families. She launched it from her living room in 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, starting with hijab-friendly masks before moving into a full ready-to-wear collection for hijabi women and anyone seeking a looser, classic fit.

Alsaeed has been working on the concept of modest wear for over a decade. She named the brand after the image of a studious girl who loves waking up on Monday mornings to get dressed for school, and built it to fill a gap she saw in the fashion industry's approach to modest clothing.

In late 2022, Studious Monday released its first full Fall/Winter collection, titled "Modest Mod," which drew on British 1960s and 1970s mod aesthetics. The collection used corduroy, recycled polyester, and wool to create bold silhouettes. That same year, Alsaeed told WDET that the 2020 Black Lives Matter movement had moved the conversation forward for people of color in fashion, though she noted there was still a long way to go.

The brand later expanded into sustainable uniforms for Muslim schools and added boys' wear to serve entire Muslim families. In 2025, Nawal called into the How I Built This Advice Line, where she and Guy Raz debated whether to keep the distinctive "Studious Monday" name or rebrand for broader accessibility to the immigrant families she serves.