Fantastic bras, body positivity and more: In conversation with
For the longest time, girls and women in Bangladesh have refrained from talking about their bodies…that too, in public. When we needed pads for periods, we mouthed it out to our friends inaudibly. It is also no surprise we did the same when someone’s bra strap surfaced from under their shirt in a room full of people. Long story short, breasts, bras, and lingerie have always been excluded from conversations.
The experience of shopping from Dhaka College is often awkward as salesmen ogle at women’s chests and hand them bras, out of which, only one or two would actually fit. Monoshita Ayruani realised that she could travel and purchase lingerie from Thailand or Singapore, but there is a group of people who are unable to do so. For that reason, she and her brand, SHAPE, thought it was high time we addressed the elephant in the room.
Monoshita already had 8 years of experience under her belt, working at WebAble Digital, particularly in brand-building.
“My core strength at the time was working in humanitarian sector projects. I had previously interviewed women RMG workers in slums to learn how they were impacted by the Rana Plaza tragedy,” she recalls.
According to Monoshita, the RMG sector is a large manufacturing hub in Bangladesh where most of the workers are women. From further due diligence, she discovered that lingerie production in Dhaka College, Pink City, or any high-end stores selling bras and lingerie products, are mostly leftovers of export rejects. Being of export quality, they are mostly made for European or American body standards, as opposed to Bengali or South-Asian body types.
“Initially, I just wanted to introduce size consultations to help people find the right products. However, the existing product gap and taboos made me realise that size consultations alone cannot solve this problem. So, I decided to start a business that will specifically cater lingerie and bras,” says the entrepreneur.
Thus, SHAPE was founded in September, 2019. Over the last few years, the brand has been able to serve a large number of women and more recently, foster collaborations with various social media influencers.
