This paper explores the contemporary identity politics of the "melhafa" as a style of women’s dress in parts of southern Morocco where it is predominantly worn by Sahrawi Arab women. A dyed, long woven piece of cotton that is draped over the head and body, the melhafa has served as the quotidian garment for Muslim Arab women in Hassaniyya-speaking communities in parts of North and West Africa since the precolonial era. It blends artisanal West African methods of cloth dyeing with North African and Arab veiling customs. In the postcolonial period, the melhafa has been largely transformed from a hand-dyed product made by women to a mass-produced commercial good sold mainly by male merchants throughout the region. The sociopolitical implications of this style of dress have shifted as well, and the melhafa has been imbued with a variety of social meanings as a visual representation of Sahrawi cultural identity in areas where it is currently worn. Based on field data collected in Morocco, Western Sahara, Algeria and Mauritania as part of a larger project on Sahrawi performance art, this paper examines Sahrawi women’s use of the melhafa as a strategy to promote the visibility of Sahrawis in areas of Morocco where they comprise an ethnic minority and to promote projects of cultural revival and political representation. Secondly, it explores reasons for the increasing popularity of the melhafa among non-Sahrawi Moroccans in southern regions of the country, where it has rapidly become a new dress style of choice due in part to its affordability compared to other forms of women's dress. This new trend has also diminished the garment's ability to serve as a discrete identity marker for Sahrawi women.