Vogue US unveiled its February cover featuring Kamala Harris, over the weekend. It was inspiring to see that the Vice President-elect and the first Black and Asian American woman to serve as vice-president in American history, will be the focus of the next issue of Vogue, but the images caused controversy on social media.
Shot by Tyler Mitchell, the first African American photographer to land a Vogue cover in 2018 (the September one featuring Beyoncé), the images were criticised by some social media users who wondered if the magazine had lightened Harris' skin after the shoot. Vogue reassured that hadn't happened, but there were also comments on the composition of the print cover. The latter is a full-length shot of Harris in front of pink silk and green damasked drapes, colours inspired by her Howard University sorority, Alpha Kappa Alpha, the oldest of the historically Black sororities.
In the image Kamala Harris wears a dark Donald Deal jacket (she often opted for the New York-based designer in other occasions in her career), a white T-shirt, dark trousers and her favourite footwear, the humble and practical Converse Chuck Taylor sneakers. This decision seemed inappropriate or almost disrespectful to some people, but Vogue felt this informal image reflected her approachable nature, besides Harris' Converse sneakers have become a key part of her signature style (in a previous post we mentioned other accessories that became an iconic part of prominent figures such as Madeleine Albright's pins or U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's collars). Harris has been wearing them a lot during her career trail, so maybe rather than being disrespectful of the role she will be taking, they symbolise the fact that America will need a very dynamic figure, ready to step up and face the many challenges on the horizon.
In another picture (closer and more formal and apparently favoured by more readers) that accompanies the main feature focusing on her career and experience and on her plans at the White House, Harris is wearing a Michael Kors powder blue suit. Vogue highlighted that Harris and her team had control over her clothes, hair and makeup, and she was able to choose the clothes she is wearing in the images. In a way the clothes weren't the problem, but the background may have been improved and the connection with her sorority may have been symbolised in a different way, in a nutshell Vogue will have to start seriously working on its systematic racial bias.
Last year, the editor-in-chief of Vogue, Anna Wintour, offered some kind of formal mea culpa in a memo, stating that she took full responsibility for "mistakes" made during her 32-year tenure at the magazine. In that occasion Wintour apologised for publishing material deemed intolerant, not giving space to Black people at Vogue and not doing enough to promote Black staff and designers at the fashion magazine.
For what regards the attention on Harris' style, well, it looks like vice-presidential fashion will be a trend this year (things officially started when she donned a Carolina Herrera suit matched with a Tory Burch white silk bow blouse in suffragette white for her speech in November) and there is already a great interest (there are also some rumours about Hollywood stylist Karla Welch working on Harris' style) in what she may be wearing at the inauguration ceremony (will she promote American fashion and maybe opt for a Black designer or choose a designer born in another country but living and working in America, like First Lady Michelle Obama did at her husband Barack Obama's inauguration in 2009 when she wore a lemongrass wool lace shift dress with matching overcoat by the late Cuban designer Isabel Toledo?). For the time being and while following her for a while, the main thing we have discovered about Harris and fashion is the fact that she wears her clothes again and again, so sustainability seems to be a priority in her lifestyle and that's good news.
For what regards the politics and fashion connection, you can bet that, apart from Harris, there will also be attention on First Lady Dr. Jill Biden, who will definitely usher in another era at the White House with more functional styles that will hopefully make us forget about Melania Trump's dubious style, split between the "I really don't care, do you?" approach, the femme fatale in stilettos in an emergency (remember when she visited the Hurricane Harvey victims?) and the military dictator look. Yet let's also hope that Kamala Harris and Jill Biden's clothes and accessories will just be a way to reshift people's attention onto politics, democracy and the Covid emergency. So far, rather than just Harris' style, we should indeed pay attention to what she says and in particular to her motto "I may be the first to do many things, make sure I'm not the last."
For the time being Former First Lady Michelle Obama, who often featured in fashion shoots, and had three Vogue covers in 2009, 2013 and 2016, also praised Harris in the Vogue feature. One person who may not be too happy about the cover will probably be Donald Trump, who retweeted last month a tweet from Breitbart News stating "The elitist snobs in the fashion press have kept the most elegant First Lady in American history off the covers of their magazines for 4 consecutive years" (actually Melania had her cover when she married Trump, probably one of those decisions that Anna Wintour now regrets...). Well, we're lucky social media de-platformed Trump last week, otherwise he would have spent more time posting deranged tweets about fashion and the Vice-President elect, but guess he's got other things now on his mind as the House began today the process for his impeachment after Trump incited last week a mob that assaulted Capitol Hill.
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