Fashion week across London, New York, Paris and Milan is the perfect time to see how inclusive the fashion industry is. The numbers really canāt be denied. Whatās really stood out this season is that racial and trans/non-binary visibility has increased but, frustratingly, every other aspect of diversity has slowed down.
The Fashion Spot has released itās bi-annual diversity report, which found that more women of colour walked the runway at the 242 shows which ran during February 2018. Out of 7,608 models, 32.5% of castings were models of colour, a 2.3% rise from last Septemberās shows.
Transgender and non-binary models also featured significantly more than in previous years. 56 transgender and eight non-binary models walked in 52 shows. This time last year, only 12 trans and non-binary models walked the 2017 shows in February.
However for size diversity, the story is less positive. Plus size castings made up a mere 0.4% of the models. Also a tiny 0.2% of castings were models aged over 50. Not so fun fact: this has been the lowest on record since Spring 2017.
As always, diversity ranges city to city. New York comes in first place for having the biggest range of women walking at NYFW, with London coming in second, Paris third and Milan last. The latter city was the least diverse across the board - however, many designers showing in all the cities missed the mark, as no racially diverse non-binary models walked and most designers included only one to four diverse models out of an average of 30 models.
