YOU KNOW YOU ARE A DIE-HARD FASHIONISTA WHEN......MY THOUGHTS ON THE VOGUE ITALIA BLACK ISSUE

new york - so to finish my sentence, you know you are a die-hard fashionista when you spend your last - and i mean LAST - coins on two issues of a magazine. i don't know about you, but the stand i went to charged $16 per issue, and i found it critical to buy two (one to thumb through and one for my personal archives) so i spent $32 bucks on two magazines. not a lot of money, but when you don't have a lot of money.....anyway, i digress. so i finally got my hands on the vogue italia all black issue and after hopping up and down with glee and explaining to the two people online how important the issue is (to very dry responses and blank stares) i painstakingly examined the issue. what do i think.....?

what i loved

• just the fact that there is an all black issue. there is beauty in diversity for sure, but as blacks ( like many other minorities) are visually marginalized in fashion magazines, it was a feast for the eyes and mind to see model after model and story after story specifically on people of color.


• the broad range covered of topics in the magazine. as you will see - or already know - vogue italia didn't necessarily y limit themselves to black models, they talked about magazines like essence, actors like angela bassett and legends like grace jones. the subject matter was very well rounded


• the luxurious photo spreads. primarily i am talking about naomi campbell and tocarra as they were the only two to have real, full on, multiple pages, of spreads in the magazine. although there was a lot of t*ts and, a*s, it was done as tastefully as humanly possible. i truly loved the photos.


• the multiple covers. oh i loved it! it took me a second to notice that there are actually four cover girls. i thought it was an ingenious move and actually compels you to want to buy more than one. i scooped up the jourdan dunn and liya kebede ones.

what i didn't

• i don't speak italian (clearly, not vogue italia's fault or issue). the mag was definitely visually pleasing, but i felt like i missed a lot because i didn't necessarily understand the context of some of the spreads and articles.


• disproportionate pages. okay, as much as i love and live for tocarra, did anyone else find it strange that she got so many pages? in fact she was one of only two models of color who had a real photo spread. legends like iman, alek and tyra (above) really had just a few pages. it just seemed odd and lopsided. anyone else concur?