Luxury Brands Facing Challenges to Confront Racist Attitudes

At the point when luxury designer brands arranged online networking presents to show solidarity with Black Lives Matters protests, brands got a mess of blowback.

L’Oréal showed their solidarity towards this cause with their #BlackoutTuesday posts. In reply to these posts, Munroe Bergdorf a transgender model and actress, backlashed at L’Oréal group for firing her three years ago when she raised her voice against racism in strong language. She termed L’Oréal as a “beauty brand of hypocrisy”. 

American actor, Tommy Dorfman who was a part of a recent campaign of Salvatore Ferragamo, referred to this Italian luxury brands as a “homophobic and racist work environment”.

Common Instagram followers of various luxury brands heaped on, testing fashion houses to accomplish more than just posting a dark square on their virtual platforms, by rather making runways, magazine covers, meeting rooms and imaginative studios showcasing more diversity.

There were several scandals by luxury brands in the past which faced a lot of racial backlashes, to name a few; Prada’s Little Black Sambo bag charm, Gucci knitwear recalling blackface and Dolce & Gabbana’s anti-Asian comments.

The U.S fights foundational bigotry, which are spreading far and wide, are likewise placing the focus on the fashion world in its job as a social guide, and encouraging insiders — some with rewarding arrangements that regularly accept their watchfulness — to speak up.

As per Tamu McPherson, an American content creator, “People have fire under their belly, their stories are strong, and their voices are being heard. If the industry ignores them, they can be kept accountable. Everyone is sharing, and corroborating, their stories.”

McPherson has been working with several luxury brands in Europe since 2013 and he said, “In seven years, I am still one of the only black people invited into those spaces. That is unacceptable”.

She described the fashion industry as “steeped in racism, anti-Blackness and white privilege.”, in a letter posted on June 6 on her website, “All the Pretty Birds”. She claimed that the fashion industry never wanted to listen but now they are hearing because of the shocking murder and pandemic.

Ferragamo responded to the post by saying, “No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion.”

A person close to Ferragamo said that the brand features models of all colors and race in its runway shows. He mentioned that about half of Ferragamo’s Fall 2020 runway models were of diverse races.