Svaha Makes the Coolest, Most Thoughtful Geek Fashion for Women and Girls
Do you know a young woman who wants to be a scientist, astronaut, or fighter pilot? Do they love books, dinosaurs, the solar system, and everything else that’s good in the universe? Does this describe you too? Good news: Svaha Apparel is here to clothe you gloriously. And all of their dresses have pockets.
The first spark of inspiration came when Svaha founder Jaya Iyer’s young daughter developed a love for space—and Iyer couldn’t find any space or science-themed clothes for girls. Thanks to Svaha, this won’t happen again.
Iyer, who has a Ph.D. in fashion merchandising and wrote a textbook on Fashion in Emerging Markets, told us: “I did end up buying her a t-shirt from the boy’s department. It didn’t matter to her, but it bothered me. I didn’t want my daughter to feel that only boys are supposed to be astronauts and love space-related things. That’s when I decided that I wanted to create this brand that would shatter all gender stereotypes, for both girls and boys.”
As fantastic as Svaha’s offerings for girls are (and, as Iyer points out, not just for girls! All of the shirts and hoodies are unisex, and everyone looks good in a dress), I’m in ecstasies over the outfits for adults. Listen, can we talk about this moon & stars skirt?
Svaha’s clothing line was designed to be empowering for people of every gender identity. The company has created pieces that run a gamut of brainy affiliations, ready to dress people who love to do science experiments, are fascinated by space, bewitched by math, obsessed with art, and taken with tomes. All of the dresses are named for famous historical women in science—Marie Curie, Rosalind Franklin, Ada Lovelace, Ruby Payne-Scott, and Dorothy Hodgkin. They’re also hard at work on a special design that’s coming out to honor the late NASA mathematician Katherine Johnson.
While you got me with an Ada Lovelace-named dress, what’s especially cool about Svaha is their clothes delve into all kinds of geek-centric areas that can be trickier to represent—like book spines on a bookshelf, space telescopes, and even Cryptocurrency. There are also whimsical designs like carousel horses and fluorescent jellyfish. The interests displayed are delightfully diverse, and adult sizes range from XS-5XL.
Svaha doesn’t stop at STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math)-inspired dresses. There are skirts, blouses, t-shirts, cardigans (with pockets), hoodies, leggings, socks, underwear, and sleepwear in adult sizes—plus the same for kids and babies, not to mention matching family sets. Additionally, there are pins, scarves, mugs, jewelry, bags, and more accessories along these amazing themes. Phew. Please gift me with one of everything.
I mean—be still my nerdy writer’s heart—there’s a dress called “the evolution of writing instruments” and others that feature punctuation marks and typewriter keys. Am I dreaming?!
In a move that made me gasp, ALL OF THEIR DRESSES HAVE POCKETS. Here are just a few of my favorites, out of many:
Frustration with how often clothing made for women doesn’t have real or deep enough pockets has been a long-simmering discourse online. That’s why it’s so awesome to see the pockets here. When I asked how this had come about, Iyer explained, “We made dresses with pockets as we believed that was how all clothes should be—with pockets! So, pockets were always a part of our design plan. But, now, our customers love us a lot more due to them!”
THE LEGGINGS ALSO HAVE POCKETS!!
You guys, this constellation dress GLOWS IN THE DARK.
I know many people who would love to rock Svaha’s fashion daily, and on special occasions—from software engineers to teachers to archivists to authors (I can already see some of these designs being a hit on con panels), to office workers who want to show off their love of Python code or caffeine. I’m about to go buy a “Pi Puns” baby onesie for my friend who just gave birth because I know it’ll be a unique and stand-out gift. Svaha offers thoughtfully packaged-together gift boxes by topic, like this one for young readers or fans of Cthulhu.
It’s rare to find clothing that lets us fly a geek flag high while also remaining beautiful and practical (did I mention there are pockets?). And if you’re trying not to spend a lot these days but still want to treat yourself, there’s some fabulous stuff on sale.
This is a great time to support businesses with an excellent mission and an empowering message if you can. Check out all of the outfits featured here and more at Svaha, and let us know which ones caught your eye in the comments.
Svaha founder Jaya Iyer (center)
(via Svaha, Svaha on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Pinterest, images: Svaha)
Want more stories like this? Become a subscriber and support the site!
—The Mary Sue has a strict comment policy that forbids, but is not limited to, personal insults toward anyone, hate speech, and trolling.—
Have a tip we should know? tips@themarysue.com
