#Education is key #wehavetodobetter #vernonfrancois #Ignorance #blackgirlmagic #allhairisgoodhairĪ post shared by Vernon François on at 9:33pm PDT

Our girls, our young women deserve better. It’s breathtaking to me that not one person looked at this shot and had the same reaction that the internet seems to be feeling since the campaign broke. Prior to this campaign appearing this photograph will have been seen and APPROVED by countless ‘professionals'. My heart breaks imagining yet another girl from my community sitting in front of a mirror being ignored by the team around her, left to her own devices because someone didn’t know how to handle her texture. This beautiful young girl’s #kinky hair appears to have had very little to no attention yet all of her counterparts have clearly sat in front of someone who was more then capable of styling other hair textures. This post is just an assessment based on all my years of seeing situations like this happen time and time again. Before I begin, I do not have the facts, nor have I seen any statement by #H&M or the team who worked on this. It’s essential that we have a conversation about this photograph from the campaign. My heart breaks imagining yet another girl from my community sitting in front of a mirror being ignored by the team around her, left to her own devices because someone didn’t know how to handle her texture.” This beautiful young girl’s #kinky hair appears to have had very little to no attention yet all of her counterparts have clearly sat in front of someone who was more than capable of styling other hair textures. In his post about the ad he says “This post is just an assessment based on all my years of seeing situations like this happen time and time again. To be clear, this girl has beautiful coils that should be celebrated, styled or unstyled, and when the photo posted we were unsure (as François admits) what the context was surrounding the shoot and how her hair came to be in this photo. Her hair and edges are uncombed, appearing that no one at the campaign shoot touched the girl’s 4C hair. This morning, celebrity hairstylist Vernon François posted a photo on Instagram from a recent H&M ad that includes a little Black girl with her natural hair pulled into an undone ponytail.

H&M has been called on the carpet for an ad that has sparked a frenzy on social media. In case you were languishing for controversy, with all the fashion weeks passing with no known cultural appropriation scandal, no Blackface hitting stores, or campaigns with blatant racial undertones, today you’ll get your fill.

H and m ad controversial