The company H&M has come under heavy fire following the release of a marketing campaign which contained a young black model who has been described as having “messy” natural hair.
The image has spread like wildfire across social media with people calling the image “Inappropriate”.
People have claimed that the image shows that there are industry professionals out there who simply do not know how to style black hair, with the main critique of the advert coming from Vernon François, a global celebrity hairstylist.
The image was released on H&M’s website with the young girl sporting a floral hoodie.
François shared the image on Instagram , writing:
“It’s essential that we have a conversation about this photograph from the @hm_kids campaign. Before I begin, I do not have the facts, nor have I seen any statement by #H&M or the team who worked on this. This post is just an assessment based on all my years of seeing situations like this happen time and time again. And its got to stop.”
François hoped that in calling out the brand they would “have a conversation” about the problems that the image throws up.
The celebrity stylist went on to explain how he felt sorry for the young model. He lamented the fact that the young girl in the shoot didn’t get the attention she deserved from H&M’s own stylists prior to the shoot. He also expressed a desire for more stylists to be educated in different hair styles.
A lot of people took to the comments agreeing with François’ anger at the ad.
François continued to write:
“My heart breaks imagining yet another girl from my community sitting in front of a mirror being ignored by the team around her, left to her own devices because someone didn’t know how to handle her texture. As if that’s not bad enough…. Prior to this campaign appearing this photograph will have been seen and APPROVED by countless ‘professionals’. Let’s say conservatively 50 people […] Our girls, our young women deserve better. Let this be a moment of learning. #Education is key”.
The issue quickly started trending on Twitter, with most people initially agreeing with the outrage.
However, over time public opinion began to change as people started sharing the images of the rest of the young models who were chosen for the shoot.
Shots of all of the children showed that they all had what people were calling “messy hair”.
Several people highlighted that it was only the black girl who had been singled out for her hair, when the rest of the children also had hair which was, as people put it, supposed to look like the child had just come home from school.
H&M quickly tweeted out a statement regarding the controversy explaining their position.
According to the Daily Mail , H&M’s statement read as follows:
“We are aware of the comments regarding one of our models for H&M Kids. We truly believe that all kids should be allowed to be kids.
“The school-aged kids who model for us come to the photo studio in the afternoon after school and we aim for a natural look which reflects that.”
A lot of people also began sharing their concern for the young girl in the photograph.
There is a concern that the young girl will take the controversy personally, and so plenty of people shared their messages of positivity for the young model.
Back in 2017, American retailer J. Crew came under fire for an advertising campaign of their own.
The internet quickly became divided over whether the company had or hadn’t appropriately styled the hair of the young girl.
The debate became very heated with some people accusing the brand of irresponsibly styling the model’s hair, and with others claiming that all of the models in the campaign had been sporting a unanimously “messy look.”
With a growing concern that the young girl will feel responsible for the controversy, messages of positivity became all the more crucial.
Hopefully the young girl in the advert understands that regardless of what people are saying, this is not an assault on her. She has done fantastically well to land such a large modelling job and should be proud of her achievements.
h/t: Yahoo & Daily Mail
