Watchdog says nude Cara poster is not offensive... but bans it near schools
POSING seductively for a designer perfume advert is something of a rite of passage for young supermodels.
Now Cara Delevingne has become the latest to go under the spotlight, for her racy billboard campaign promoting Black Orchid, a perfume by Tom Ford.
The Advertising Standards Authority received two complaints after the huge poster appeared on a hoarding above a shop on the corner of Brick Lane, in East London.
The watchdog has ruled the poster should not be seen within 100 metres
‘Classical in nature’
of a school but said it ‘was unlikely to cause serious offence and did not degrade or objectify women’.
It shows the 22-year- old model holding a bottle of the perfume and lying naked in a pool of water with the side of her breast and buttocks visible.
One complainant believed it was degrading and objectified women. Another said it was inappropriate for display where children could see it or where churches and mosques were nearby.
But Tom Ford Beauty argued the image was not sexual, but highly stylised and artistic.
The ASA said: ‘ Whilst they accepted the model was nude... they believe neither her pose nor facial expression were sexually suggestive and were classical in nature, and had been depicted in art.’
The ASA applied the same principles in 2000, when posters for Yves Saint Laurent’s Opium perfume featuring model Sophie Dahl appeared on billboards.
The ASA banned that image, which showed Miss Dahl nude and arching her back with her breasts fully visible, from sites where it could be seen by children.