Naomi Campbell Wins Fashion Icon Award

Naomi Campbell's fuming over the lack of modeling opportunities for black and ethnic models has paid off. She received the Fashion Icon Award at the Thurgood Marshall College Fund Front Row charity event last Saturday.


The Front Row event was created to honor black and Latino fashion professionals and while making her acceptance speech, the supermodel also took the opportunity to continue voicing her sentiments on racism in the fashion industry.

While the 39 years old supermodel has considered herself fortunate to be working in the fashion industry for over 25 years, progress still needs to be made. Calling the lack of minority models in the industry as "injustice," Naomi Campbell stressed:

"Nelson Mandela always told me to speak my mind and the consequences will take care of themselves... There is a small group of people whose minds we have to change because we are living in a multicultural society."

Aside from Naomi Campbell receiving the Fashion Icon Award, other honorees of the Front Row event include Fashion Institute of Technology's president Dr. Joyce F. Brown, makeup artist Sam Fine, and Oprah's hairstylist Andre Walker. The Avant-Garde award was given to the late Michael Jackson and was accepted by his brother Marlon Jackson.

Black Models To Fight Against Lack of Diversity In The Fashion Industry

The Italian Vogue magazine is set to feature black models exclusively in its issues. This is in response to the lack of diversity in the fashion industry.

The fashion industry have long been criticized for using mostly white models in fashion shows and many other modeling venues - runways, editorials, advertisements, and fashion covers.

One of the most publicized attempt to put an end to the so-called “white-washed fashion” was probably that of former model agency owner Bethann Hardison who have represented supermodels Tyson Beckford and Naomi Campbell. Hardison convened two summits to discuss the refusal of some of the most influential fashion personalities to embrace black beauty. As support for her call, CFDA president Diane Von Furstenberg sent out a letter prior to fashion week urging designers to incorporate models of all ethnicities onto their catwalks.

The efforts, however, was to no avail. The fall '08 fashion season ended with white models flooding the runways.

And so Italian Vogue came back with a vengeance, as few days earlier the editor-in-chief of Italian Vogue Franca Sozzani made a public statement that said, "We are using a lot of black models, like Iman! ...Not only the models of today - a lot of different girls."

The magazine's purpose was made clear by Sozzani: "Because nobody is using black girls. I see so many beautiful girls and they were complaining that they are not used enough."

In addition, all of the other editions will be incorporating not only black models, but other under represented minority groups in their magazines much more than usual over the next few months.

We just hope that this bold campaign for diversity in the fashion industry would not turn out to be a case of “black versus white” issue. After all, it wouldn't be called diversity if all the white models become black.