In my Introduction to Islam, I briefly dicussed the issue of hijab, the Islamic dress for women. In that article I made a couple of points:

1) The Western culture seems to be obsessed with a very narrow ideal of feminine beauty, and women are derogated if they do not match this ideal. Many women spend hours each day picking just the right outfit and styling their makeup and hair before they will even step out of the house. Any feminist will tell you this obsession with women's beauty and sexuality is bad for women and should be ended. Isn't modest dress a good way for a woman to get off this merry-go-round and to tell people that they will have to judge her by her intelligence, personality, and character, not her appearance?

2) When men dress to be respected, they wear a business suit that covers them to throat, wrist, and ankle, and they keep their hair simple and plain. When women dress to be respected, shouldn't they also cover to throat, wrist, and ankle, and make sure that their hair is not a decoration? Clearly, men are not expected to play the "beauty game". If women want equality with men, shouldn't they take the same attitude to dress that men do?

These are reasons that hijab is appealing to women, any why a woman might choose to dress like that even without looking at the religious aspects.

Reference:

www.muhajabah.com/dresslikethat.htm