Just as Paris Fashion Week got underway, we were appalled to hear allegations that Lanvin had sent out a mandate to casting directors saying that they “do not want to be presented with women of color.” Though a spokesperson quickly denied the allegation, the Lanvin runway show the next day only featured four, out of a possible 41, non-white women to present its FW17 collection. We weren’t impressed.
It became apparent to us here at WTG that, despite the broadening inclusion of the fashion industry, these kinds of outdated, closed-minded attitudes are still very much alive and well below the surface.
As we spent every weekend of Black History Month celebrating black women who have made positive, global change in their own industries, we have decided to extend that celebration to focus on the wealth of talented black models who didn’t make it to the Lanvin runway.
Each of the eight models below walked for major shows during Paris Fashion Week, including Céline, Haider Ackerman and Louis Vuitton. Among them are Lineisy Montero, the first model to walk the Prada runway with a natural afro, and Nykhor Paul, who set up the campaign We Are Nilotic in order to give a voice to the women in South Sudan who are affected by the civil war.
Despite not making the cut for Lanvin this year because of their unique ethnic backgrounds, these women still know how to pull together an outfit when they're not on the runway. We’ve recreated some of their best looks from the past few weeks, and hope that Lanvin will reconsider its hiring policies before next season’s schedule begins.
