Diversity campaigers Monday condemned the darling of Paris fashion week
after he failed to cast a single model of colour in his two
headline-grabbing shows. Demna Gvasalia, who counts black US music
superstars Rihanna and Kanye West among his biggest fans, used only white
models in shows for his own hip Vetements label and for Balenciaga Sunday,
where he has just taken over as creative director.
The British-based Models for Diversity group slammed his choice as
“appalling, unbelievable and bewildering”. Its founder Angel Sinclair told
AFP that the omission was all the more “shocking after the great strides at
New York fashion week” and in other Paris shows — among the most diverse
ever staged in the French capital.
“What was he thinking? I can’t believe that Kanye (West) could have
anything to do with him,” she said. Last month the rapper turned fashion
designer — a regular front row guest at previous Vetements shows —
threatened to poach Gvasalia, 34, from the
Spanish label.
“I’m going to steal Demna from Balenciaga,” he tweeted. Sinclair, a former
model, said given that the Georgian-born designer had built his reputation
on edgy streetwear inspired by black fashion culture, not
using black models was “gross”. “He is insulting all the black people who
have been supporting him. He really needs to be educated,” she said.
Gvasalia, 34, who fled his war-torn homeland as a child for Germany, has
said that he gets his inspiration from riding the metro through one of the
most ethnically mixed parts of Paris. But photographs of previous Vetements
shows seen by AFP show his label only
ever used a non-white model once on the catwalk, an Asian model for the
2015 autumn winter collection.
Balenciaga apologised Monday for any offence the show might have caused, but
said “the ethnic origin of models did not enter into consideration in any way
when casting models for the show. “An unintended consequence was the lack
of diversity… of the models who
finally went on the runway. Balenciaga is committed to equal opportunity
and to no discrimination of any kind (because of) shapes, sizes, races or
ages,” it told AFP. Vetements has yet to comment.
The brand’s edgy, oversized look has taken Paris fashion by storm since
it
began two years ago as an anonymous collective of creators.
Its models’ unconventional looks quickly became part of its rebellious
appeal.
So influential has it become that Vogue fashion guru Suzy Menkes tweeted
“Come the revolution, Vetements is where to dress” after seeing its show on
Thursday.
Gvasalia often casts his friends and fellow designers, or plucks people
straight from the street for their interesting, melancholic or often ravaged
faces.
But the American website Fashionista said that was no excuse as they
called
out the young designer for his lack of diversity after the Balenciaga show.
Casting skinny white models may have been “on-brand, but it was
problematic
to exclude non-white models, not to mention inconsiderate of the brand’s
many
fans and customers of different races,” it said.
“Sending the message, deliberately or not, that these ‘cool kids’ can
only
be white isn’t only inaccurate, but marks a step back for the industry,” it
added.
Koche and H&M Studio had earlier drawn plaudits for their multiethnic and
mixed-aged casting, and while Japanese label Undercover also used only white
models, they ranged in age from their teens to their seventies.
Nearly half of the models Balmain’s tyro Olivier Rousteing sent out were
women of colour.
The mixed-race French designer, a favourite of the Kardashian clan, has
been a strong advocate of diversity and a supporter of supermodel Naomi
Campbell’s campaign for designers to better reflect the world’s women on the
catwalk. (AFP)