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PARIS — Of all the shoulder jewels hanging in Louis Vuitton’s Paris showroom on Thursday, Naomi Campbell chose one of the quieter and more versatile bags — in its coveted monogram — for her latest charity initiative.
“I think it’s going to sell really well,” she said of the soft, square style, its signature canvas stitched in strips atop metallic leather.
Campbell has plenty of motivation for the bag to be a blockbuster at retail, as Vuitton has pledged to donate a portion of sales to the White Ribbon Alliance, an organization dedicated to reducing maternal mortality worldwide.
The bag, not yet named, will retail for 1,900 euros, or $2,789 at current exchange, at Vuitton’s network of 439 stores starting next March. The launch coincides with the 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day that month.
Campbell, who started modeling for Marc Jacobs at age 16, said the designer didn’t hesitate to concoct the aid scheme, pulling it together during the crunch time between his signature show in New York and the Vuitton show on Wednesday.
“People say fashion people don’t do anything. We do a lot,” she said in an interview.
Campbell is a global ambassador for the alliance, which lobbies world leaders to support safe motherhood initiatives and reduce preventable deaths. She already has pledged to donate all proceeds from a forthcoming auction of her Hermès bags.
While Campbell did not attend Vuitton’s fashion show earlier this week, she gave a stamp of approval to the wild clothes and oversize wigs. “I’m a big Angela Davis fan, although I’m not sure if that was the inspiration,” Campbell said. “I love an Afro. I’ve rocked an Afro many a time.”
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