The Latest British Vogue Cover Has Been Accused of 'Black-Washing' it's African Cover Stars

The cover photograph from UK Vogue February 2022

The February 2022 issue of British Vogue has caused quite a storm. 

The cover features nine models Adut Akech, Amar Akway, Majesty Amare, Akon Changkou, Maty Fall, Janet Jumbo, Abény Nhial, Nyagua Ruea, and Anok Yai—who range from various African countries including Ethiopia, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, and South Sudan. 

The cover was considered a pioneering moment as it focuses on African beauty on a large scale. However, the choice to edit the models’ skin tones to look darker, among other artistic liberties that were taken have caused some controversy.

It is one of two cover photos that were released this month (a second cover image features one of the group, supermodel Adut Akech, posing alone) and, according to British Vogue's British Ghanaian Editor-in-Chief Edward Enninful, the images aim to spotlight the rise of the African models shaping the industry. 

Adut Akech, on alternative cover. She is currently the most successful black model working today

However, what was intended as a pivotal moment in the fashion industry and a championing of Black talent in the fashion industry, the cover seems to have caused upset across the board. Stephanie Busari a journalist for CNN from Lagos, Nigeria, wrote that although she desperately wanted to love the images for their pioneering efforts, she couldn't help but feel let down. She writes, "my heart sank when I saw the picture of the models. I wanted to love it, but the image left me confused and raised questions about the execution of this important cover.

Why are the models depicted in a dark and ominous tableau, the lighting so obscure to the point they are almost indistinguishable on a cover meant to celebrate their individuality? Why were they dressed all in black, giving a funereal air, and an almost ghoulish, otherworldly appearance? 

A picture from the editorial

Why were they sporting strangely-coiffed wigs? Many of these women wear their natural hair normally and it would have been great to see that reflected on a cover celebrating African beauty. Additionally, on the cover, the models' skin color appeared to be several shades darker than their normal skin tone." 

Some Twitter users critiqued the models’ appearances.  “This cover is weird. The lighting is off. The backdrop is off. The various skin tones and highlights are missing. And the African models are all in European styled wigs. Huh? @BritishVogue definitely needs to hire Black women photographers,”  user @NyxGreenfyre wrote.

Lesego Tihabi responds to Nichelle: "I just would like black women to be represented as they are. Those women are stunning. Sometimes the European (or fashion) gaze exoticizes black women by darkening them to “make art” and it’s giving a bit of fetish. Even very dark skin has tones and highlights and isn’t just 1-D."

Another picture from the shoot

Twitter user Mr Adeyemi  @ActiveYouthUK wrote of the cover "A lot to deconstruct here; The framing, the deliberate darkening in post production, the dead expressions & the absence of joy saying so much about how white fashion institutions view Black women, the artistic choice to put them all in Black despite vivid colours probably working best for this particular group of skin tones etc. But all I really want to say is we're in 2022 and Vogue still can't properly light Black women. This lighting is a travesty."

Stephanie Busari goes on, "the lighting, styling, and makeup, which purposefully exaggerated the models' already dark skin tones, reduced their distinguishing features and presented a homogenized look. Was this the best way to celebrate Black beauty? Would it not have been better to let their natural, unique beauty shine through?"

Amy (@amyjv) wrote, on Twitter: "I would be surprised if a black person was involved in anyway in the production of this. This is why representation is important just not in front of the camera but also behind it." (In fact the entire production team in front of and behind the camera was black.)

Others suggested this was 'black-washing' and no different to 'white-washing' black women's skin, as was done in the case of Kamala Harris on a previous Vogue cover. 'Fetishising black women's skin' and 'catering to the white gaze' are the main criticisms thrown at the team who created the image.

A behind-the-scenes video of the photo shoot that Vogue posted on social media shows the models having their hair and makeup done, and some of their skin tones are undoubtedly lighter in the video.

Adut Akech photographed in similar fashion by same photographer Rafael Pavarotti

The photographs were taken by Afro-Brazilian photographer Rafael Pavarotti, and the images are consistent with his visual style (he has used the effect of darkening black women's skin in various other editorials he has been involved with over the years) of presenting Black skin in an ultra-dark manner. 

According to 1854, the publisher of the British Photography Journal, his work uses a mix of both analogue and digital photography and often involves deep colours, studio shots and darkroom techniques.

'The celebration of Black and indigenous experience specifically will always be a part of my work, because it's also a part of me', he told the digital media company.

'As an Afro-Indigenous Brazilian photographer, my existence and work are already political. With just one photo you can open up a whole history, or tell a whole story through different colours, styling and mediums.'

Of the Vogue shoot he says: "This is a celebration of women, of matriarchy, and of the beauty of Black women," Pavarotti said of his first British Vogue cover shoot in an article accompanying the pictures online.

"They are the past, the present, and the future," he added.

Makeup was by Ammy Drammeh and styling by Edward Enninful, whoreplaced Alexandra Shulman at the magazine. Enniful's appointment was met with praise and seen as the ushering in of a new era for the magazine. 

Following the announcement, Naomi Campbell said she was 'looking forward to inclusive and diverse staff' under Mr Enninful.

One of his first tasks was to assemble a 15-strong squad of women, dubbed 'Edward's Angels', charged with bringing a 'diverse perspective' into Vogue editions across Europe. 

He was given control following a restructuring which pushed him to the upper echelons of the Conde Nast empire, answering only to US-based editor-in-chief Anna Wintour. 

The highest-profile Angels included Edward's right-hand women Vanessa Kingori and Sarah Harris, as well as four new European editors – Italy's Francesca Ragazzi, France's Eugenie Trochu, Spain's Ines Lorenzo and Kerstin Weng of Germany. 

A source at British Vogue said at the time: 'Edward is the original champion of diversity at Vogue and has hand-picked these girls to be the most glamorous woke squad in Europe. 

'He has tasked them with transforming the European Vogue titles. They are preparing to roll out their new front covers in the next few weeks and the change will be clear for all to see at last.' 

Edward Enniful and Adut Akech in 2018

Of the February cover shoot he said of his inspiration in the accompanying article to the shoot: “I saw all these incredible models from across Africa who were just so vivacious and smart.”

He adds, “Fashion tends to follow waves. We’ve had the Brazilian wave. We had the Dutch wave, the Russian wave, the Eastern European wave… And while, in the last decade, the Black model has come to prominence, I love that we are finally giving more space to African beauty.”

'These girls are redefining what it is to be a fashion model.' 

'We need to ensure these girls last. We have to invest in them, nurture them and support them with editorial, with advertising, with shows.'      

'It's sad and heart-breaking for me to see girls who are on the rise suddenly taper off. 

'We need to ensure these girls last. We have to invest in them, nurture them and support them with editorial, with advertising, with shows. It has to be 360. Alek Wek didn't suddenly become Alek Wek. 

'There was a group of us behind girls like her, propelling them forward. This is what we have to do in all our different roles. Getting these girls and then throwing them away after one season? That has to stop.'

Vogue's Instagram advertorial for the magazine introduced the issue with the following: 

So what has happened here? Clearly the intention from a team was not to create an image that caused offence - it was after all a team comprised of people with black backgrounds. Did they miss the mark? Was the controversy intended? Or has their message simply been misunderstood?

Amongst all the disappointment, there have been messages of support.

Nyagua Ruea struts the A/W2020 Paris runway for Mugler

One of the models in the shoot, 20 year old South Sudanese Australian, Nyagua Ruea has said of the shoot: 'For the first time in the history of my modelling career, we had an all-Black team, from the photographer and stylist to the make-up artist, hair stylist, set designer and of course the models. Getting to experience this first hand was such a moving moment. I hope we can get more of these moments in the future.'

Others liked what they saw and praised the magazine for publishing a cover celebrating diversity.

“Beautiful @BritishVogue, kudos to you for featuring these mesmerising women on the cover,” music artist Henry Fricker tweeted.

“I really like this, why do dark skin girls need high beam lighting all the time, sometimes be creative,” another person wrote on Twitter.

“Black Girl Magic. This is the Vogue cover we never knew we needed,” someone else tweeted.

Fashion in Times of Crisis: Then and Now

 It’s the pandemic phrase repeated over and over these days: we’re in a war, we’re fighting a war. It may not be a war that’s raining down bombs and bullets, but there are strangely similar parallels to the last great conflagration of the second world war: a lethal enemy is being fought on the home front as we shelter, in families, in communities, and by heroes and heroines on the frontlines in hospitals and care homes. And meanwhile, it’s precisely the second world war generation — our grandmothers and great grandmothers who lived through it — who we’re all being called upon to protect. As the ’40s speak to current times with a startling new relevance, what that era has to teach us — about them and about ourselves — is suddenly a fascinatingly useful area to explore.

The events of the past few months now shine the strangest light on the meaning of John Galliano’s Maison Margiela spring/summer 2020: it was a collection he dedicated to the public spirit and heroic values of women and men in the second world war. Nurses’ uniforms; army, navy and airforce uniforms; images of female French resistance fighters and undercover agents — it was all there. There’s no way that Galliano, even with his zeitgeist-attuned antennae, could have known about the coming pandemic. Nevertheless, he’d hit on his inspiration for a very good reason. What we need to learn now is a bit of backbone: “Reverence for the lessons of history, and what they taught us,” as he put it. “Stories of hope, heroines and liberation are forgotten as history draws ever closer to repetition.”

Repetition? Now, maybe we're seeing that wartime public spirit flooding back in all the good ways: volunteering, activism, generosity, the at-home creativity and resourcefulness — the discovery of all the strengths none of us realised we had in us even a month ago. Overnight, the relevance to fashion is right there with us, too. From the need to wear protective clothing, to consider and love what we already own, to turn over factory and domestic sewing production to public service, to share, repair and conserve — it goes all the way through to intersecting with the bigger battle of our time, saving the planet.

“Ask yourself, how can I be of service?” were the words Phillip Lim chose when he pitched in to add his voice to a home-recorded Vogue.com video bringing news of how the CFDA/ Vogue Fashion Fund has been repurposed as A Common Thread, in support of Covid-19-affected people in the American fashion community. His stirring choice of phrase was a flag-waving example of how people in fashion — both vast conglomerates and individuals — have been rising to levels of cooperation and creative thinking that were almost unimaginable before the worldwide coronavirus emergency.

It was also a reminder of something that had dropped out of our collective memory during these past two decades of speeding overconsumption: the fact that fashion steps up to play honourable roles in times of crisis, and always has. It did so during the second world war. It did so among designers, women who volunteered, women who adapted creatively to shortages; it was there on the pages of Vogue, and in how its editors played their parts.

So if there’s ever a time to take heart from how our amazing grandmothers and great-grandmothers did it — while still caring about fashion and beauty — it’s surely now. Here are six eye-opening comparisons between then, and how we are now.

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The 13 Street-Style moments that defined 2018

Before we dive deep into our wish lists for spring/summer 2019, let’s take stock of the past year in the lives of the world’s most powerful street style stars. 2018’s headline fashion moments off the catwalk came in the form of belt bags, barely-there Nineties sandals and a renegade mix of exotic animal prints.

Your speedy recap: Cycling shorts became an overnight sensation when paired with a sleek suit jacket. Dior’s cult Noughties hit, the saddle bag, returned, as did Prada’s reinvigorated Linea Rossa (styled by reluctant street style star, Lotta Volkova). What about the box-fresh trends to copy/paste into your 2019 wardrobe? Tonal dressing is here to stay (expect an abundance of not-so-boring beige thanks to the street style elite), and couture-like detailing is making a comeback when the warmer weather returns.

Here, Vogue charts 13 definitive real-life style lessons from 2018 that refocused fashion's centre of gravity.

The Saddle Bag Returned

Dior’s first female artistic director, Maria Grazia Chiuri, knew exactly what women wanted when she released her modern take on the house’s turn-of-the-millennium It piece, the saddle bag. Spotted here on the wrist of a showgoer at Copenhagen Fashion Week in August, this reborn classic has quickly become a wardrobe hero for a new generation of street style stars that were too young to wear it the first time around.

Beige Is Now Anything But Boring

Unlikely as it sounds, full-look beige is slated to become 2019’s power colour of choice thanks to Burberry, Chanel and Chloé’s spring/summer collections. The reigning queens of street style were, naturally, ahead of the pack. Cue British Vogue’s deputy editor, Sarah Harris, sporting her biscuit-hued Christopher Kane sweater on the Paris leg of fashion month in September 2018.

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Vogue's New York Fashion Week Survival Guide

 Vogue’s Chioma Nnadi outside the New York menswear shows in July.

In 2018, the concept of fashion “do’s and don’ts” isn’t particularly relevant. Yes, the ’80s are back this fall—but so are the ’90s and the ’70s. Enormous coats are having a moment, but that doesn’t mean you “can’t” wear a sleek, classic trench if that’s your jam. Not into sparkly slip dresses? Utilitarian jackets and army pants feel just as fresh. Flip through Vogue’s street style photos, and you’ll see girls in couture gowns and stilettos next to ladies in T-shirts and jeans. In other words . . . anything goes! At least, when it comes to what you’re wearing. Tackling New York Fashion Week requires more than the right outfits, though; even those of us who’ve spent years (or decades) covering the shows tend to make a few blunders here and there. So we’re constantly asking colleagues for their tips and tricks: How do you stay cool on the subway in 90-degree heat? What shoes should I get that won’t give me blisters? Where do you go for a quick meal between shows?

There’s clearly an art to getting through the week without losing your cool, so we asked Vogue editors for their ultimate New York Fashion Week do’s and don’ts (and, yes, the latter category tends to be more entertaining). We’ve compiled them into a “survival guide” of sorts, and it’s a must-read before you embark on the first day of shows tomorrow. Read on for clever organizational tips, calming scents to try, a sneaker suggestion, and the foods you should (and shouldn’t!) eat.

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Black designers have to work twice as hard - and are still 'emerging'

Anna Wintour and Diane von Furstenberg

As far as fashion goes, participating in the Council of Fashion Designers of America/Vogue Fashion Fund can be a pivotal moment in an emerging designer’s career. Winning the $400,000 prize and a year of mentorship from some of the industry’s biggest names has the power to change the trajectory of a brand, or even create one. It’s what brought us Alexander Wang, Proenza Schouler, and Public School. It isn’t often that outsiders are privy to the making of a fashion label, and the awards, which are live-streamed each November, offer an inside look into how winners were selected. Which is why a photo on Eva Chen’s Instagram last week showing this year’s panel of CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund judges was particularly telling.

Seated at a long table were 10 judges with the future of the fashion industry in their hands: five women and five men; three were of Asian-descent, and all extremely fair-skin. From Anna Wintour to Diane von Furstenberg, the group is comprised of fashion veterans who are very much a part of Vogue’s insular world. But given the fact that streetwear is actively helping to reshape the fashion industry (see: Supreme’s James Jebbia, who was named menswear designer of the year at the 2018 CFDA Awards, Louis Vuitton appointing Virgil Abloh as men’s artistic director, and Gucci collaborating with Dapper Dan after being accused of copying one of his most famous designs), wouldn’t it make sense to compile a judging committee that is better connected to today's most relevant trends, most of which were created and/or popularized by Black people?

That’s not to say real diversity only counts when it includes Black people, but it does speak to a level of mindful inclusion that continues to elude us. Trends stemming from Black culture are everywhere, and yet there remain so few Black designers on the Fashion Week calendar. Even fewer are members of the Council of Fashion Designers of America; there are just 15 Black designers on the CFDA’s membership roster of more than 500 people.

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Prince: The greatest rock 'n' roll closet of all time

On the second floor of Paisley Park, atop the “little kitchen” and just past the elegant dovecote wherein resides Majesty and Divinity, two archivists tirelessly attend to the fashion archives of the performer formerly and forever known as Prince. Bethany Hopman and Rebecca Jordan, who hail from Pennsylvania and Maryland, respectively, spend their days preserving and cataloging the thousands of jumpsuits, trenchcoats, high-waisted trousers, silk blouses, Lurex tunics, man heels (600 pairs thus far), pendants, and pj’s that constitute one of the greatest rock ’n’ roll closets of all time. (There are four archivists in total.) Some of Prince’s most iconic looks are on display on mannequins throughout Paisley’s public areas; when we visited last winter, some were on loan to the O2. But mostly, the clothes and accessories are wrapped in acid-free tissue and are packed in boxes, kept for eternity with the original sketches attached in a nearby binder.

And there are many, many, many binders. At one time, these rooms housed Prince’s in-house atelier, a full-service tailoring shop that made virtually everything he wore at the height of his fame and certainly everything worn by him and the Revolution in live performances and on film. The designers and tailors who worked for him communicated primarily through their drawings, which were interpretations of a general brief he’d thrown out (Barbarella meets the Godfather, say), and these sketches were placed in a binder with fabric swatches for his review. He would respond with sticky notes of approval or further instruction (“let’s do these in fuchsia and black, too”; “make these charms like Mayte’s purse”), and two weeks later, the process would begin again. In the meantime, the clothes would keep coming: Nehru jackets, matador boleros, skinny-hipped pants with a smidgen of flare, asymmetrical lapels, and single-suspender onesies, all rendered in variations of four-ply silk charmeuse and dupioni (internationally sourced through mail order). There was a mannequin made in his size as Prince himself did not, as a rule, do fittings. Jim Sherrin, the talented tailor who came to Prince from Guthrie Theater in the early ’80s and made all of those definitive slender-trouser looks, never touched the artist. Helen Hiatt, the brilliant wardrobe mistress who worked on various aspects of Purple Rain and Sign o’ the Timesbefore overseeing the entire studio for Lovesexy and Graffiti Bridge, remembersthat she would very occasionally be granted a fitting with Prince. “I finally said, ‘Prince, I am going to send a ruler over so that when you say one inch we know what you are talking about.’ We had to set some ground rules.”

So dig, if you will, this picture: a performer of stadium magnitude, at the apex of his career, with no stylists, no art directors, no contracts or monied deals with brands or haute couture houses, no outside consultants. Instead, he hired seamstresses and tailors, often from Minneapolis, which has a strong craft tradition and theater community, and he trusted them to interpret his rather extraordinary, gender-rules-be-damned notions in silk and lace and pearls. He would tear pages from women’s fashion magazines and let the studio interpret it for a rockin’ dude. He would say to Hiatt, “Can you write on my clothes?” And she would pick a font, get his okay, and take it to a friend’s house to be silk-screened in a basement.

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Inside Seven Decades of Black Fashion Design

Only 1% of black fashion designers' presentations are covered by Vogue Magazine. The industry’s lack of diversity spurred The Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology’s Ariele Elia and Elizabeth Way to organize Black Fashion Designers, an exhibition featuring runway looks from Stephen Burrows, Hood By Air, and Olivier Rousteing for Balmain. The exhibition showcases formal evening wear, menswear, streetwear, couture, prints and textiles, and spans more than a half century of black dress, using history to examine black fashion design.

“There have been a few exhibitions that have covered black fashion designers or black fashion style but most of them have been on individual designers such as Stephen Burrows or Patrick Kelly,” says Elia, who is the Assistant Curator of Costume and Textiles at The Museum. “For this exhibition, we wanted to take a wider look at black fashion designers specifically because there have been many talented designers that today are pretty much unrecognized in the fashion industry.”

Tracy Reese, Spring 2016

Black Fashion Designers features 75 looks by 60 designers. The exhibition explores early forays by black designers in dressing notable Americans. The beige wedding dress Jacqueline Onassis wore to marry John F. Kennedy was designed by Ann Lowe in 1953. The exhibition notes that Lowe learned her craft from her mother and grandmother. Lowe’s dress alludes to the eight years of the Obama administration, in which designers like Duro Olowu and Tracy Reese have dressed the first black First Lady of the United States, Michelle Obama.

The exhibition also speaks to the influence black designers have played in the building of American fashion into a global phenomena. In 1973, Stephen Burrows was one of the designers representing America in The Battle of Versaille Fashion Show, showcasing French and American designers in a French palace. Burrows’ presentation is widely considered to have helped elevate American design to the level of Parisian houses. On display in the exhibit are designs by Patrick Kelly, the black designer who found critical acclaim in Paris by subtly using the racism he experienced at home in America to inspire his designs. His button dress is said to be rooted in watching his grandmother create the family’s clothing during the Jim Crow years in the South.

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