New York Fashion Week Open It's Arms To Diversity

Back about two months ago I wrote a post called 2014: Changing The View On Disability all about how some parts of the entertainment industry were letting people with different disabilities be apart of their campaigns and breaking the stereotype and assumptions of what people may have had about what a person with an impairment can and can't do.

Well I'm happy to say that in 2015 we are still continuing that fact!

It all started when American Horror Story actress Jamie Brewer was announced to be the first model with down syndrome to walk the run way at the biggest week in fashion in New York.

Brewer walked for designer Carrie Hammer as part of her "Role Models, Not Runway Models" show.

The initiative of the show was to empower working women, no matter how diverse the are.

Another person who wants to make a change in the entertainment industry is  Katie Driscol founder of Changing The Face Of Beauty, the foundation campaigns how beautiful people are and helps to include everyone in advertising no matter what they look like.

 Her only daughter Grace has autism and any mother knows having a little girl means playing dress up and that's when Driscol, a photographer created her blog 5 Boys and 1 Girl Make 6 which features Grace modeling for her mom. With the help of social media she began to post pictures of her daughter and reached out to vendors in hopes to use her daughter in their advertisements. That's when she decided to make a difference for her daughter and others like her.

"We're a society that's all about inclusion for children, but when you look at imagery, you almost never see children with disabilities of any kind." Driscol told People Magazine.

The main reason she started this campaign to bring awareness that people with disabilities are more then their diagnosis.

And recently she and Grace joined Jamie to be apart of Carrie Hammer's show at New York Fashion Week.

Katie Driscol, her daughter Grace, with Actress Jamie Brewer and designer Carrie Hammer

But that wasn't the only show that was incorporating diversity, Antonio Uzi’s show included many people with disabilities.

  

The show titled "FLT Moda Loving You" had a partnership with an Italian research foundation for Spinal Cord injuries.

There is also a model with a rare skin condition named Winnie Harlow.

 Harlow, who's real name is Chantelle Young-Brown has vitiligo, a skin condition that is responsible for killing skin cells that cause skin pigmentation. 

 She may seem familiar because she has been featured in the 21st cycle Tyra Banks' wildly popular modeling competition show "America's Next Top Model".

 She didn't win the show, but that didn't stop her from quitting her modeling dream and breaking the view of how a model should look and it was recently announced that she has landed 2 major campaigns for Diesel's new Spring/Summer 2015 campaign and in Spanish brand Desigual's 'Say Something Nice' campaign.

Harlow on the runway for Desigual at New York Fashion Week.

Diesel's Spring/Summer 2015 ad.

 Both campaigns promote diversity and positivity.



I'm so glad that these high profile fashion companies are realizing that there are more types of people out there than what has been put out into the world as the ideal look a person should have. 

Only time will tell how far this will go, but it's a start...

-Lupita