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Here’s the story about how Jasmine + Marigold started 7 years ago while I was on maternity leave….
It was spring 2016, and I was stressing out about returning to work full-time and was not sure how I was going to parent and be a good employee, all at once.
And, there was the added stress of my child being mixed-race and knowing that not only do I have to raise a confident girl, but a confident girl who is proud of her Pakistani/Muslim identity and respects and honors her dad’s Christian, Eastern European family.
I couldn't find any cute onesies or pajamas celebrating my daughter's heritage. Sure, you can find options for people celebrating Christmas or Hanukkah—but what if your family celebrates two holidays at once? What if you're a Muslim child and you want to celebrate your holiday and culture?
With Eid being a month after my leave ended, I leaned back into my old design days, downloaded Adobe Illustrator, and designed the first “My First Eid” onesie to celebrate her holiday -- I looked all over the internet and nothing like this existed, which was shocking to me! Surely other Muslim families wanted to celebrate with festive clothing?!
By mid-May, Alayna was taking long naps and I was plugging away on learning how to start a business: calling factories and local print shops, and learning all I could online with such limited available resources.
I knew deep down that whatever my daughter was, I wanted her to feel confident enough to one day wear a Pakistani wedding gown to hold onto our heritage.
I loved the flowers present at Pakistani weddings: Jasmines, and Marigolds. So, the name Jasmine + Marigold came to be; two flowers so deeply ingrained in South Asian culture to identify the brand.
As I got deeper into designing items, however, I realized that there were so many needs to be met: 1. There were no clothing lines that celebrated Muslim holidays. 2. There were no clothing lines that were modern in their design yet still culturally-relevant (i.e., it's fine to have a ton of moon and star items, but not every item you design has to be plastered in moons and stars). 3. There were no Eastern kids' clothing lines that offered products in quality, sustainable fibers.
We launched at the end of May 2016, just two weeks before I returned to work full-time from my maternity leave, and we have evolved ever since then. We've been featured on Buzzfeed and a few other online media!