Items21The creator’s order
  1. 1Dorothea ChurchDorothea ChurchDorothea Towles in Paris, from 1949 The starting point for Black models in European couture. Towles went to Paris in 1949, where Christian Dior hired her to stand in for one of his regular models, and she spent about five years in France modeling for houses including Jacques Fath, Elsa…0
  2. 2China MachadoChina MachadoBorn Dec 25, 1929China Machado in Harper's Bazaar, February 1959 Machado broke the color line at a major American fashion magazine when Richard Avedon's photographs of her ran in the February 1959 issue of Harper's Bazaar. The publisher had balked at printing them, and Avedon pushed them through. Some accounts…0
  3. 3Donyale LunaDonyale LunaBorn Aug 31, 1945Donyale Luna on British Vogue, March 1966 David Bailey photographed Luna for the March 1966 cover of British Vogue, the first time any edition of Vogue put a Black model on its cover. It came eight years before American Vogue did the same, which is why Beverly Johnson's later first is always…0
  4. 4Naomi SimsNaomi SimsBorn Mar 30, 1948Naomi Sims on Ladies' Home Journal, November 1968 Sims took Black beauty off the fashion pages and into the mainstream American household magazine. Her November 1968 Ladies' Home Journal cover was followed by Life in 1969 and Cosmopolitan in 1973, a run that showed publishers a Black cover star…0
  5. 5Beverly JohnsonBeverly JohnsonBorn Oct 13, 1952Beverly Johnson on American Vogue, August 1974 The milestone most people mean when they talk about Black models and Vogue. Johnson's August 1974 cover, shot by Francesco Scavullo, made her the first Black woman on the cover of American Vogue, and she went on to become the first Black woman to…0
  6. 6Tracey NormanTracey NormanBorn Dec 14, 1952Tracey "Africa" Norman on the Clairol box, 1975, and again in 2016 In 1975 Norman's face went on the front of a Clairol hair dye box, Dark Auburn shade 512, and stayed there for six years. Nobody at the company knew she was transgender, and when she was outed on a magazine shoot her career ended…0
  7. 7Naomi CampbellNaomi CampbellBorn May 22, 1970Naomi Campbell on Vogue Paris, 1988 Campbell's fame can bury the specific door she opened. In 1988, at 18, she became the first Black model on the cover of Vogue Paris, now Vogue France, fourteen years after Beverly Johnson's American Vogue first and more than twenty after Donyale Luna's British…0
  8. 8Emme (model)Emme (model)Born Jun 30, 1963Emme in People's 50 Most Beautiful, 1994, and as a Revlon spokesmodel Emme is widely considered the first full-figured supermodel, and she got there when most companies would not book a model above a size 6. People named her to its 50 Most Beautiful list in 1994 and again in 1999, and in 1998…0
  9. 9Tyra BanksTyra BanksBorn Dec 4, 1973Tyra Banks on the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit cover, 1997 Banks had shared the 1996 Swimsuit Issue cover with Valeria Mazza, but in 1997 she became the first Black woman to land a solo cover, shot in Harbour Island in the Bahamas. The Swimsuit Issue reaches far beyond fashion's own readership, so…0
  10. 10Alek WekAlek WekBorn Apr 16, 1977Alek Wek on the cover of Elle, November 1997 Wek, who fled Sudan's civil war as a child and was scouted at an outdoor market in Crystal Palace, London, in 1995, is widely cited as the first African model on the cover of Elle. Gilles Bensimon shot her in white against white for the November 1997…0