Luxury fashion house Prada is set to undergo racial sensitivity training as part of a settlement agreement with New York City after a lawsuit over an alleged racist display in a Manhattan store window in 2018.
This suit is the first in which a brand was being held liable for its imagery.
Prada’s display first gained attention when uploaded to Facebook in 2018 by Chinyere Ezie, a civil rights attorney. Her post showed images of the store display of backpacks and figurines with “denigrating blackface imagery,” according to NBC News.
Ezie was shocked and outraged, and walked into the store “only to be assaulted with more and more bewildering examples of their Sambo like imagery,” per Ezie’s Facebook post.
The post went viral, and Prada issued an apology via Twitter. The company reportedly noted that it will donate sales from the products to “an organization for racial justice.”
We are committed to creating products that celebrate the diverse fashion and beauty of cultures around the world. We’ve removed all Pradamalia products that were offensive from the market and are taking immediate steps to learn from this.
Full press release attached. pic.twitter.com/rKhnKjasDz
— PRADA (@Prada) December 16, 2018
But that would not be enough.
The settlement terms first appeared in The New York Times. Prada is now required to undergo sensitivity training, as well as “racial equity training” for all employees, including founder Miuccia Prada. The brand must also incorporate a diversity inclusion officer within the upcoming 120 days for oversight into the design process and outcome.
The company took it upon itself to establish a Diversity and Inclusion Advisory Council shortly after the scandal, but the settlement states that it must remain in existence for the next six years. The company will additionally disclose the racial and ethnic makeup of their employees a year after signing the agreement, per the New York Times.
In the same article, Ezie stated that she was satisfied with the result of the complaint.
“I wanted this to be a moment of reckoning for the company about how they would do business for the next 20 to 30 years,” she told reporters. “For me this represents a new model of corporate accountability. One that began with a hashtag and online advocacy and resulted in a real opportunity for off-line change.”
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