After each Fashion Week there’s always a discussion about diversity on the runway. How were different ethnicities represented? How about sizes? Or ages? And most importantly: how are these numbers really stacking up against the previous years? The Fashion Spot recently conducted a diversity report on the recent Spring/Summer 2016 major runway shows—New York, London, Milan and Paris—to see what kind of progress, if any, is being made. Focusing on major issues like rage, age, gender identity and size, their survey gives us a much clearer idea on what really takes place on the runway.
The report shows that diversity during Fashion Week has been improving—the numbers are changing slowly, but surely. This season, of the 373 shows and 9,926 featured models, 77.6 percent were white as opposed to the 80 percent seen in the spring and the 83 percent in the previous year. (It was noted that the models at the Kanye West show were not included due to the inability to accurately identify each model.) Of the major fashion weeks, New York was the most diverse in every category showing more racially diverse models, plus-sized models, older models and transgender models. Milan on the hand was the least racially diverse, and didn’t feature a single plus-sized, transgender or older model.
Each season Black, Asian and Middle Eastern models have all seen a small uptick in their percentages and this year was no different. Overall, Latinas were the only ones to see a decrease this year falling from 2.9 percent last season to 2.6 percent this month. At NYFW the numbers were higher, of the models cast, 4.2 percent were Latina, 8.7 percent were Asian and 10.7 percent were Black. At LFW Latinas represented 1.7 percent of the models, Asian 8.5 percent, and Black 8.2 percent. PFW models were 1.8 percent Latina, 7.1 percent Asian and seven percent Black. MFW was the lease diverse at 1.3 percent Latina, 6.3 percent Asian, and 6.5 percent Black.
Of course some designers are more conscious of diversity than others, and designers like Chromat, Tracy Reese and Sophie Theallet topped the list. Chromat had 20 models, five were Black, four were Latina, three were Asian and two identified as “other.” Tracy Reese and Sophie Theallet both came in second with 60 percent of their runway being racially diverse, and Martin Grant and Rahul Mishra tied for third with a model diversity on their runways of 50 percent. Giorgio Armani, Nina Ricci, Erdem, Roksanda, and Saint Laurent each hired only two, non-white models each, while several designers had only white models on their runway.
While racial diversity has improved this season, only five models this year were over the age of 50. Four of those five walked in NYFW: model and actress Veronica Webb walked for Sophie Theallet, ‘70s supermodel Pat Cleveland walked for Elie Tahari and two others appeared in VFiles and Eckhaus Latta shows. Only one appeared at PFW in the Nehera show. Overall, the over 50 age set was the least represented group at Fashion Month with only 0.05 percent.
Plus-size apparel, and the representation of plus-sized women, has been a hot topic for a few season’s now, but it doesn’t seem like designers are listening. Only 0.1 percent of models were plus size—a total of 14 women, and all of them walked in NYFW. Those 14 women came from a total of two shows, Chromat and Addition Elle and two of those models, Denise Bidot and Sabina Karlsson, walked in both shows. The report does make note that many American designers including Ralph Lauren, Michael Kores and Calvin Klein have plus-size collections, but failed to show any of these women in their Spring/Summer 2016 shows.
The world of fashion has been slowly opening up to transgender models over the years, but they’re still greatly underrepresented at Fashion Week. This season transgender models made up 0.06 percent of the appearances on the runway, half of which were seen at NYFW. Valentijn de Hingh appeared in both David Laport and Peet Dullaert’s shows at PFW while Andreja Pejic walked for Giles in London. In New York, Geena Rocero showed at Carmen Marc Valvo, Farideh Arbanian was seen at Hood By Air and Ines Rau walked at Nicole Miller.
