If French beach towns continue to ban the burkini, women won't stop wearing it, they'll simply holiday elsewhere — including, just maybe, Australia.

That's the view of the controversial garment's Australian creator, Aheda Zanetti, whose design has been attracting all kinds of attention this week.

Cannes, Villeneuve-Loubet and Sisco on the island of Corsica have banned the burkini, and Le Touquet on the Atlantic coast is planning to do the same.

The mainly conservative mayors who have imposed the ban said the garment, which leaves only the face, hands and feet exposed, defies French laws on secularism.

The burkini debate is particularly sensitive in France given deadly attacks by Islamist militants — including the Paris attacks, which killed 130 people last November, raised tensions between communities and made people wary of public places.

"My first reaction is ... Oh my God, it is just a swimsuit, for God's sake," Ms Zanetti told RN Drive, when asked about the uproar.

She said the idea the garments were a symbol of female oppression was misguided.

The garment attracted criticism from the highest levels of the French Government. ( Supplied: Ahiida )

"It's symbolising freedom, healthy living, confidence; it's symbolising a choice that [these women] make," she said, adding that not all her customers were Muslims.

"You get a lot of women that are conscious about the exposure of skin [to the sun]. You get a lot of women that have just become mothers and are self-conscious."

French Prime Minister Manuel Valls was quoted this week in support of the bans, saying the burkini was not compatible with French values.

"It's the translation of a political project for a counter-society based on woman's enslavement," Mr Valls reportedly said.

Ms Zanetti said that was out-dated thinking, because women were the ones making the decision to buy the swimwear.

"I think he is digging a hole for himself where women will be purchasing the garment no matter what," she said.

"If they are banning them in their beaches, [women] should be holidaying in Australia."

The Collective Against Islamophobia in France (CCIF) last week filed a complaint against the bans.

The group's spokesman Marwan Muhammad said they restricted fundamental liberties and discriminated against Muslim women.

"This summer we are witnessing a hysterical political Islamophobia that pits citizens against one another," he said.

ABC/Wires