Adut Akech Is Estée Lauder's newest global brand ambassador and Cover of ELLE Magazine's August issue

Adut Akech says, “I never, ever, in my wildest dreams, thought I would have achieved half the things that I have now,” you believe her. I feel like this is my moment to show people—and to show the world—that yes, Black women are beautiful.”

From an international runway debut walking for Saint Laurent in 2016 to being named Model of the Year by the British Fashion Council just three years later—her life trajectory has been altogether extraordinary.

Akech was born on Christmas Day in 1999, somewhere along the route between her mother’s native South Sudan, where a civil war raged, and the Kenyan refugee camp they called home for nearly eight years. 

At 13, Akech walked in her first runway show, a local production put on by her aunt. A meeting with a modeling agency during a trip to Melbourne a few years later set her on a path that would include campaigns with the likes of Chanel, Valentino, Givenchy, and Prada. In a true full-circle moment, Akech has begun working with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees—the very agency that operates the camp where she grew up.

ELLE August 2021 ⁣
Photographer: @chriscolls⁣
Stylist: @alexwhiteedits⁣
Writer: @roxannefequiere⁣
Hair: @hoshounkpatin ⁣
Makeup: @therealofficialfrankb ⁣
Manicure: @honeynailz ⁣
Set Design: @_coopervasquez_ @frankreps⁣
Production: Philippa Serlin @serlinassociates

Read the rest of the interview at ELLE Magazine here.

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