CHARLEE FRASER
Making her catwalk debut in 2016, Charlee Fraser is one of Australia’s greatest model exports, shooting for US, Italian, German and Japanese Vogue, and walking the runways of Chanel, Prada, Hermès, Versace and Celine among others. As she appears on this, her second Vogue Australia cover, she shares details of her latest role – as an ambassador for FNFD and industry mentor – as she takes time off modelling to connect more deeply with nature and her cultural identity.
“I am an Awabakal woman with Worimi and Biripi descent from my mother and my grandmother. Awabakal land is around the Mid North Coast of New South Wales, part of it we now know as Newcastle. I didn’t grow up on Country; I was born and raised on Awabakal land and that’s how I identify, but unfortunately, that’s something I really wish I had but didn’t. That was something that was lost in my family. I do have a really strong connection to land; I’m very spiritual and I have really intense moments in certain areas. Sometimes it comes in the form of intuition and sometimes it comes in the form of visions. I haven’t really talked about it before.
As you get older, you learn more about it and you lean into intuition because you’ll think something and you do the opposite, and you realise later the first thing you thought was right. I have had a very strong intuition ever since I was little. In terms of it guiding me through my fashion career, I felt as though I was prepared for all the decisions I made.
My journey with FNFD started in 2019, before the pandemic, at the Darwin Aboriginal Art Fair. I was living over in
New York, and when Covid happened and I came back to Australia, I finally had the time to give back. It was instantly that connection that we found with me and the girls. I was like, ‘Oh my god, everything that they represent was what I was looking for.’ It was this clash of culture and fashion. It was this collision. That’s been the past two-and-a-half years now.
We have made history at Australian Fashion Week in Sydney [last year] with our Welcome to Country and with one of the first overall Indigenous shows, and we are coming back this year. This is a really beautiful relationship where I’m able to help guide [young creatives] in the fashion industry, and they’re helping me get these cultural experiences I missed out on.
I feel really proud of the work I’ve done and I feel good about where I am in my life right now. And there’s so much more to come. I’m cultivating so many more things. It’s bizarre to think my personal goals are going to reach so many other people, but I suppose it is about what I represent. I’m working on developing a model mentoring program for FNFD. It’s going to be very unique, very educational, supportive – there’s a lot going into it.
I, myself, have really struggled with my journey of belonging and identity and I’ve never felt Blak enough to feel Blak, and I’ve never identified and felt white enough, so I don’t identify as white either. So, I’m sort of this in-between. Though I felt like I struggled with my identity so much, I’m fortunate to have never had that sort of really harsh, horrible racism. I’m very thankful and grateful to not have those experiences, and I’m here for my peers who have.
In those moments, it’s important you know and believe in who you are. It’s being strong in how you feel, and that’s valid. I know I’m Aboriginal. I identify as Aboriginal and regardless of what anyone says, they can’t take that away from me. I feel it when I’m in nature and I’m having these moments; I don’t have the knowledge, but I feel it.
Being on set today, being that this is such a special shoot, it is so iconic. It’s going to be one for the history books. I love that the majority of everyone on set was female. We love and support each other’s growth and successes, because we rise together. It’s this coming together, and we all recognise how important today is, so there’s just this extra love in the room. We made it here. We did it. We are here. This is it.”
“I’m able to help guide [young creatives] in the fashion industry, and they’re helping me get these cultural experiences I missed out on”