The flash of purple abayas at a conference in Saudi Arabia’s second-largest city, Jeddah, was more than a fashion statement. It’s a sign of the changes Jeddah is embracing as King Abdullah slowly loosens restrictions on women in his conservative land.
The Red Sea port city is in the vanguard of the royal social experiment that could spur the Arab world’s largest economy. At the conference last month at the city’s Hilton hotel, women mingled with men, took questions at corporate booths and forsook the head-to-toe black abayas that Saudi wives, mothers and daughters traditionally wear in public.
