Dear jewelry industry,
We need to talk about your love of skinny white models.
Image by Jay Littman.
Pretty much the only time I see someone my size modeling fine jewelry on the internet is when I take a selfie – unless, of course, someone’s doing a “look at this brave plus sized model!” feature where the cover girl happens to be wearing jewelry.
It took me years to start regularly sharing my picture online, mostly because I feel like my image doesn’t fit into what is generally acknowledged as preferable for public consumption. So many other women are made to feel the same way, whether it’s because of their size or skin color or hair or wrinkles or because they wear a headscarf or use a wheelchair.
This is bullshit and I’m tired of it.
I have a request for you, jewelry industry. The next time you’re trying to find the right skinny white 20 year old for your ad campaign, please think again. Be brave enough to ignore what everyone else is doing, and show us something more.
If your jewelry editorials offer something more than the usual harmful sameness – especially if you feature models of color, or models who are older or bigger or unretouched – please pitch me.
xoxo,
Becky