The Sydney-based designer of a two-piece swimsuit known as the burkini says it cut her heart to hear a Muslim woman has been asked to remove hers on a French beach.
Aheda Zanetti says the controversy in France is a misunderstanding of what the burkini is actually all about.
Photos emerged this week of four police officers surrounding a woman on a beach in the southern French city of Nice. The woman is then photographed removing a long-sleeved top, and yet another photo shows police proceeding to give her a fine.
Nice is the latest French resort to prohibit the swimsuit known as the burkini, following around 15 other local authorities in the country banning them from their beaches.
Just days ago, police in another famous French Riviera city, Cannes, (cans) fined a woman for wearing a burkini on the beach while with her children.
That woman has reacted with horror -- at the whole scene that surrounded it.
(French, then translated:) "I'm horrified by what happened. I'm horrified, also, by the behaviour of people around us. There were some people that were supporting us, but there were other people who applauded the police officers and who began insulting us, and we were shocked."
Critics of the ban believe it defies France's law on secularism.
But former French president Nicholas Sarkozy (sar-ko-ZEE) has joined in on the other side of the debate.
"The burkini affair, everyone sees it's a provocation, a provocation at the service of a politicised and radicalised Islam."
Representatives of France's Muslim communities have met with the Government to discuss the bans.
French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve (kaz-eh-NUUH-veh) is calling for calm.
"The implementation of secularism and the possibility of making these bans must not lead to stigmatisation or antagonism between French people."
The burkini is a two-piece swimsuit that covers the full body.
It consists of trousers and a long, flowing top attached to a hood that covers the head but not the face. Australian designer Aheda Zanetti created it 12 years ago and says it is being misportrayed completely.
"It's been misunderstood. I don't believe they've actually understand what the actual burkini swimsuit is. I mean, we've introduced the new design to integrate and to join within the Australian lifestyle. We've taken away the stereo (stereotype) image of a Muslim female and replaced it with a hood, which is a Western style of clothing. I did that purposely to make sure that the wearer herself was not going to identified of what faith or religion, or size or colour, she was going to be."
The Sydney-based designer says she has sold 700,000 burkinis worldwide since 2008 and is now producing more than ever. Ms Zanetti says, since France imposed its burkini bans, sales have actually increased by 300 per cent.
But she speaks of pain, not profit, about the bans.
"It cut my heart, because, once again, these Muslim women are being punished. And they're such an easy target now, because they're visually identified."
Ms Zanetti says she has all women in mind in her designs.
"She could be atheist. She could be anything. She could be a cancer survivor. She could be a breast-cancer survivor. She could be allergic to sunscreen. She probably just wants to keep her hair away from her face. It doesn't matter why. So you should not judge these swimsuits on one race, (religion) because that one race is not the only race that's wearing it."
Lawyer for the Human Rights League group in France, Patrice Spinosi, says that the courts decision to remove the ban is a win for civil liberties.
