Those who have an influential platform from which to tell the story determine the narrative. In the world of fashion, the reality of what is in fashion very much depends on who is in a position of power to declare it. Photograph: Victor Virgile/Gamma-Rapho/Getty Images Trail blazer: Naomi Campbell for Chanel in Paris, 1992.

Because a dress is not just the covering on our backs, but a story of who we are, what we think, what tribe we belong to and how we view ourselves. One minute you’re in, the next you’re out.īut lately, fashion has been rife with talk of the shift in who gets to be an insider and who gets to tell whose story. Months, years or, if you’re lucky, decades later, you don’t. It’s a century-old system built on art, desire, commerce, prestige, insider access and hierarchy. How you’re viewed by the rest of your peers. Will I get a seat? Where will I be seated? Who will I be seated next to? To many, these are all very important questions, without an ounce of irony. Its dramas have been well documented in all manner of books and films with varying degrees of accuracy – Prêt-à-Porter, The Devil Wears Prada, Zoolander, The September Issue, and more. Navigating the front row can be an isolating and emotionally fraught experience for anyone. But, below the surface, a seat on the front row for someone like me means a heightened consciousness of the many who are left out.

You know better than to consider inclusion a form of validation. The front row is where the people deemed most integral to the success of those clothes – retailers, celebrities, stylists, journalists, popular internet personalities and clients – converge. A tiny little alternate universe populated by the rich, influential, beautiful and famous, along with the insiders powerful enough to determine who will become famous next. There’s the excitement of gaining entry to a rarefied world filled with the finest clothes human hands can make, designed by some of the most skilful couturiers known to woman. On the surface, the front row is a thrill. One white editor went as far as to describe it to me as a bubble bound to burst.Ĭlaiming the floor: Imaan Hammam walks for Versace in Milan, 2018. To sit in the front row of a luxury fashion show in one of these cities, home to the world’s oldest and most storied houses, is to experience a unique set of conflicting emotions, particularly as a black woman.īecause the rise of black women is the talking point that has been most attached to the label of fleeting trend. And they take place in just four cities: New York, London, Milan and Paris. But only a few hold the kind of power that impacts the way people dress and perceive themselves.

There are entire weeks filled with fashion shows in cities all over the world – Tel Aviv, Dakar, Dodoma, Lisbon, Bogotá, Liverpool, Reykjavík, Miami, Moscow, Copenhagen, Lagos. Until recently, the fashion week catwalks were a dime a dozen. The shows may have temporarily moved online and to individualised one-to-one appointments, but the power structure the front row represents is very much still here. Now, six months into the Great Pause, the front row as we know it is on hold. “With so many black women appearing on magazine covers and catwalks, do you think this is just another trend?” a white news anchor asked me another time, mid-broadcast.

Ebony fashion show runway show 2018