Breaking the race barrier

For as far back as an entire generation can remember, Naomi Campbell has been one of the most famous faces on the planet – certainly one of the most famous women, second only to perhaps the Queen, Princess Diana, or Angelina Jolie.

For close to three decades, she was one of the most in-demand models in the world, and formed, along with Christy Turlington and Linda Evangelista, a trinity among the first wave of supermodels in the ’80s and ’90s.

She began walking the ramp in the late’ 80s. In 1987, she became the first black woman in over two decades to feature on the cover of British Vogue, a feat she repeated on the cover of French Vogue a year later. The following year, she made history by becoming the first black woman to appear in American Vogue.

But the prejudice she faced for being a nonwhite model would always haunt her. She did not receive a cosmetics endorsement deal until 1999, well into her heyday. This encouraged her to raise her voice against the pay disparity non-white models endured.

Campbell gradually walked away from the ramp and switched focus to causes such as raising awareness on breast cancer, eradicating poverty, and even organ is in ga fund-raiser for the 2008 Mumbai terror attack victims. She launched the Diversity Coalition, aimed at pointing out racism in the fashion world.

She now appears in a host of television roles – from reality shows to a guest spot on the hit show Empire.