Hardtalk

‘Fashion has to be more inclusive, it has to speak to people outside the normal demographic’BBC presenter Amol Rajan speaks to Ghanaian-born Edward Enninful, who rose to the pinnacle of fashion in Britain as the editor-in-chief of British Vogue.Enninful has dedicated his career to making fashion representative and relevant to all, ignoring the accepted conventions on which type of models will make magazines and clothes sell. Even before I knew what inclusivity was, he says, I knew something wasn’t right. But now Enninful warns fashion is at risk of returning to a narrow definition of beauty, where being thin, European and young is the ideal. In this interview, he sets out an alternative vision of fashion where diversity is welcomed, and the beauty of older women is recognised - inspired by the ‘bodacious’ African women dressed by his seamstress mother throughout his childhood.Enninful arrived in London from Ghana as a boy, and was fashion director of the influential i-D magazine by the age of 18. After being