Fashion and inclusion: The Valentino case
One of the most broadcast commercials on TV these days is, without a doubt, that of Born in Rome, the new fragrance by Valentino. In the video we can admire a splendid black model in a pink dress who gets on a motorcycle and drives with a boy behind her from the center of Rome to Villa Aldobrandini, near Frascati. The models in question are the beautiful Adut Akech and Anwar Hadid, son of Yolanda Hadid, a famous supermodel between the 70s and 90s, and brother of Bella and Gigi, among the most requested and paid models of the last five years.
To an unwary eye, this clip appears to be a very common perfume advertisement, one of those broadcast a hundred times a day during the pre-Christmas period, but, if we analyze it in more detail, an interesting reflection arises. How many times do we find a black model in a fashion brand advertisement? It cannot be said that it does not happen, but it can certainly be said that it does still too rarely. In this sense, the new creative director of Valentino, Pierpaolo Piccioli, is moving in the right direction, favoring greater inclusion in the very exclusive fashion-system.
Below is a short video explaining what Pierpaolo Piccioli, in the name of Valentino, is doing to revolutionize the aesthetic canons of fashion.
The new face of the Valentino fashion house: the top model Adut Akech
"Beauty has no colors or borders of any kind" so Piccioli writes in a post on Instagram for the presentation of the new advertisement. And these are not empty words, because this revolutionary man does not make rhetoric, but demonstrates what he believes in facts. The new face of Valentino from 2018 is, in fact, Adut Akech, a 19-year-old girl, born in South Sudan, whose first eight years of life were spent in a refugee camp in Kenya, before moving to Australia, where she was victim of episodes of racism because of the color of his skin or because of his typically afro hair.
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Fashion and inclusion: how far is there to go?
It seems paradoxical that a choice of this type will make headlines in 2019, but fashion is still far behind on the road to inclusiveness, especially when it comes to races: in 2018 only 32.5% of the models were not Caucasian. However, we can console ourselves with positive news: again in 2018 the number of black models paraded in Milan exceeded 25%.
The advertising of the new Valentino fragrance is not the first occasion in which Piccioli proves to be unconventional and avant-garde. Already on March 4, 2018, the creative director had 48 models of color paraded out of 65, unveiling their rare beauty in haute-couture dresses, which put an end to the combination of black person - street style. This also explains the deep bond that binds the artist to the black model par excellence, Her Majesty Naomi Campbell, who has always been active in launching model casting even in African countries.
Piccioli shows us that fashion can be "refurbished"Without losing value, acquiring, indeed, a greater one: that of inclusiveness which, now more than ever, is needed in a society that is increasingly frightened by the different.
