The viral spread of #VogueChallenge, combined with the BLM imperative of supporting black life and wellbeing worldwide, has intensified the social media conversation on the imbalances of power ingrained in the cultural economy of fashion driven by media giants like Vogue. It is therefore no surprise that the phenomenon triggered by Salma Noor now includes also critical voices and counter-arguments …

About ten days ago, in the wake of the anti-racist protests ignited by the murder of George Floyd, Salma Noor (@capricornbbyy1 on Twitter; @itssalmanoor on Instagram), an Oslo-based student hailing from Somaliland, launched the Vogue Challenge on social media. Noor, who is also an aspiring model, created a fake Vogue cover that showed her portrait wearing a black hijab with …

Today, I finally watched Asmarina, a documentary that I have chased since it came out in 2015, but always managed to miss, wherever it showed across the country. Although it is not strictly about fashion, Asmarina is a valuable reference to understand Afro-Italian history, as it looks at the generations of Eritreans who have migrated to Italy, or were born …