Naomi Campbell’s Ad Campaign Refused Because of Her Skin Color

One would think skin color and race issues may be a thing of the past, but Naomi Campbell recently revealed how untrue that is. According to the 49-year-old and the first British black model to appear on the cover of British Vogue, she is still discriminated against because of her skin color. But then, she wouldn’t have gotten this far without her determination to break down barriers and establish a norm that is fair to people and women of different diversities. First, despite being black, she defied the barriers holding many black women down by becoming one of the world’s top supermodels, achieving mind blowing success and a £40 million fortune. Yet, she still experiences the occasional undermining and underpay due to her skin color. 

Diversity Coalition Campaign

Naomi Campbell modelled for a recent campaign, but an Asian country actually refused to accept the advert because she’s black. It is because of issues like these that propelled her to launch a campaign called the Diversity Coalition, for the purpose of improving the number of black and ethnic minority models on the catwalk. Together with late David Bowie’s model wife, Iman, and agent Bethann Hardison, they addressed an open letter to the governing bodies of the fashion industries in New York, London, Paris, and Milan. This letter brought to notice the fact that only 6% of models at the New York Fashion Week were black while just about 9% were Asian. It also pointed out some fashion houses that hardly use black models, such as Chanel, Armani, Victoria Beckham, and Marc by Marc Jacobs. 

Naomi Campbell’s Activism

The campaign proved to be successful when the figure increased from 6% to 40% at last year’s fashion weeks across the world. Although elated at the results of the campaign, Naomi noted that there is still more work to be done. The issue with discrimination against color is not just that some fashion houses or agencies refrain from using black models, but also that when they actually do use these models, their pay is always lower than those of other races. This is a major aspect Naomi Campbell felt compelled to fight against.  According to her, at first, she used to do certain campaigns because it was a prestigious fashion house or photographer, even though the pay was lower than the standard. But later on, she had to take a stand and actually refuse certain work that undermined her race by paying below standard or that wasn’t diverse enough. 

Her agent at the time was stupefied when she often turned down work because of her closely held principles. 

But I said I’m not selling myself that way, and you’re not going to sell myself that way either, Naomi says.

Naomi Campbell’s supermodel career goes way back, as she was discovered at the age of 15 while window shopping and ended up making the cover of Elle in April 1986. She is known not only as a supermodel but also as an activist. It would be hard for one country refusing to take her advert because of the color of her skin to bring her down.