After hesitating to jump into the #nobannowall conversation, fashion’s elite has made their political opinions known. New York Fashion Week Fall 2017 became something of a soapbox for anti-Trump sentiment. Designers expressed their political beliefs through T-shirts, soundtracks and even fashion-filled rallies. Front row denizens rocked #IStandWithPP pins. Models wore #TiedTogether bandanas on the runway. Adriana Lima, Grace Coddington, Winnie Harlow, Jourdan Dunn, Imaan Hammam and 76 other fashion celebrities sat down to shoot W magazine’s moving “I am an immigrant” video. Filmed at Milk Studios over the course of New York Fashion Week, the video cuts between the faces of high-profile editors, models, photographers, designers and stylists as they proclaim — in English or their native tongue — “I am an immigrant.”
Through the project, W creative and fashion director Edward Enninful (Ghana-born, U.K.-bred) hoped to illustrate that immigrants form the backbone of the U.S. fashion industry — and the nation as a whole. “People like me thought America was the best place to be creative, to be free to create, to have the freedom to be who you are,” Enninful stated. “I just thought, ‘Let’s do something that shows that we’re all from somewhere else.’”
Watch the full clip below, and try not to cry as Diane von Furstenberg closes the video with her (ad-libbed) line: “I am an immigrant. America was very good to me.”
[ via W ]
