Naomi Campbell “I don't care about the looks, sometimes hostile, that people wear on me. I wanted to be a mother"

She has often been compared to a fierce panther endowed with an unreal beauty, "

" in the words of the singer Bono, but also distant,

, as the English say, capricious, difficult to access.

Naomi Campbell is late on this summer evening, when she appears in one of the hidden alcoves of a Parisian hotel.

It is huge, sculptural, luminous, simply splendid.

“

These few words of apology and a disarming smile are enough to erase the impatience of the wait.

She also has two very good excuses: firstly, she was shooting with photographer Paolo Roversi and, as we know, Miss Campbell never leaves a studio until she is convinced that she has given her all .

"

," she says, before correcting herself: "

" Which leads to the other reason for her delay: "

At 52, Naomi Campbell is a young mother who is crazy about her one-year-old daughter, who she is raising alone.

She has always shaken up the codes and does not hide being happy to be one of these women who defy the rules of time and who shape a new society: “

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Shirt-dress in stretch jersey embroidered with ruching, belted wool kilt, and thigh-high boots in stretch knit, the Burberry set.

Photos Joseph Degbadjo / Realization Barbara Baumel

A pioneer

Naomi started working as a model at age 15.

She rose through the ranks at a blessed time when "

", she recalls.

“

Azzedine (Alaïa)

Versace

Yves Saint Laurent

“As the most visible black model of her generation, “

The activist crossed one barrier after another, becoming, for example, the first person of color to successively cover French

in 1988, then American

a year later.

Committed, she collaborated on several humanitarian projects with Nelson Mandela, whom she met in the early 1990s. A guide whose spirit she keeps ingrained in her.

"Naomi is a brilliant woman, who sacrificed herself with passion to impose racial diversity in the fashion world, and I admire her a lot for that," says Carla Bruni.

Queen of the most prestigious fashion catwalks, muse and friend of the great designers, the British supermodel is a complex and fascinating character, who sometimes seems to play the game of her own legend, both fabulous and imperfect.

The woman we meet this evening is relaxed, extremely human, passionate about her work and her multiple projects.

Over time, I became more open to nuance.

Naomi Campbell

Miss Figaro.

– Do we owe your Olympic form to having become a mother?

Definitely.

I feel fulfilled.

Motherhood is a very personal choice.

I am convinced that a woman knows if and when she is ready to have a child.

My daughter arrived at the right time.

This feeling doesn't really have to do with age;

it is linked to experience, to instinct, to availability.

I always knew I was going to be a mom one day, but I never imagined how much joy a baby could fill me with.

My daughter is only one year old, but she is already a small person.

I see her character forming: she is very determined, full of joy, curious, dynamic… She is already walking and absorbing everything at a surprising speed.

I take it everywhere I travel with me.

The experiences of different places are very formative for the children.

That's how I grew up.

Did you travel a lot when you were a child?

I was 5 years old when I took my first plane alone to join my working mother.

I vividly remember my little pleated skirt and the tag I wore around my neck with my name on it.

It was my first adventure and I was very excited.

I lived in London, but my mother, of Jamaican origin, was at the time a dancer who traveled a lot.

She was only 20 when she had me, and she had the courage to pursue her career.

I was always with her during her trips abroad.

What did she teach you and what values ​​do you want to pass on to your daughter?

I come from a dynasty of extremely strong women.

I was raised by my mother and my grandmother, Ruby Louise Campbell Russell, whom everyone called Ruby.

She arrived in Britain from the Caribbean, invited by the British government after World War II.

She traveled all over the world and she was loved by many people.

Like my mother, she was the matriarch of the family and she kept us together.

She infused great strength in me.

My grandmother and my mother taught me to be independent, respectful and very disciplined.

My need for perfectionism, which can also play tricks on me, comes from there.

Very young, you met the greatest creators.

What memories do you have of enlightened couturiers like Azzedine Alaïa and Yves Saint Laurent?

Alaïa was for me the father I never had.

When I met him in the mid-1980s, he asked me for my mother's phone number: she spoke French fluently, and, at the end of the conversation, reassured, she entrusted me to him. .

He was marvelous with me: he took me to museums explaining to me his passion for art, he watched over me, over my health.

I lived in his apartment-workshop, rue de Moussy, near the Picasso Museum, in Paris.

Sometimes, in the evening, I sneaked into the shop to dress in her most beautiful creations and go out on the sly.

He came to fetch me, a little angry… And not without having corrected the lapel of a coat collar that I hadn't placed correctly according to his taste!

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Long wool tuxedo dress, Saint Laurent by Anthony Vaccarello.

Nike sneakers.

Personal jewelry.

Photos Joseph Degbadjo / Realization Barbara Baumel

We were very possessive of each other.

I had access to the man, but his genius was something else.

No one could match him.

Yves Saint Laurent, meanwhile, was a painter: his eye went beyond what we see objects, colors.

To meet him, we had to wear a knee-length skirt and a blouse, very simple.

During our first conversation, I was nervous, impressed.

He walked over, handed me a hat, and said, "Do you like it?"

There was a world in these words, they meant that I was welcome in his universe, that an association was born, made of marvelous exchanges.

Yves was very important in my career, he gave me one of my first contracts.

He was the king of fashion.

He created ready-to-wear,

We often hear that the fashion world is superficial, without pity or ties, but this is not at all true.

Carla, Christy, Claudia, Helena and I have built a real family together.

Naomi Campbell

Did you stay close to all the star models with whom you paraded at that time?

We often hear that the fashion world is superficial, without pity or ties, but this is not at all true.

Models like Carla (Bruni), Christy (Turlington), Claudia (Schiffer), Helena (Christensen) and I have built a real family together.

We practically cohabited for more than thirty years, shared our meals, our beds, our experiences, fragile and difficult moments.

What is your relationship with Paris?

I lived there in the 1990s, rue de Grenelle, and also recently during the confinements.

I love Paris, it's my chosen city;

France has done so much for me!

She welcomed me with her wonderful designers, her Fashion Week, her catwalks and her sense of celebration.

I love spending whole days in museums, it's so inspiring.

I go there often because they are places to connect with yourself.

Last year, on the occasion of the bicentenary of Baudelaire's birth, I read one of his poems,

, at the Musée d'Orsay .

You are currently collaborating on a book project with Paolo Roversi.

What relationship do you have with him?

I have worked with Paolo for thirty years.

He is a friend and a great artist.

He knows my face and my body in detail and we are making a book of nude photos together.

When I pose for Paolo, as for any photographer, my body is a tool: I always try to understand what the creator wants from me.

I am a vector, because the goal is to transmit art, beauty.

This is how I have always imagined fashion.

I don't look at myself in photos.

I don't even recognize myself.

I see the eye of the photographer and that's what I like.

I am also starting a project with another great artist, who is here tonight, Kehinde Wiley, a wonderful African-American painter whose, for example,

I don't fight with age, but I make sure to stay in shape, take care of my skin and look good.

Naomi Campbell

How has the relationship with your body evolved over time?

It's hard to believe me, but I've long had a complex about my body.

I'm my own worst enemy when it comes to finding fault with him.

It's also because our look as models is obsessed with perfection.

But there is no question of an egocentric need.

We would like to serve each item of clothing, to bring it to life in the most sublime way possible.

Over time, I became less severe, softer and open to nuance.

I see the beauty of a defect, I feel tenderness in noticing it.

And then, I have always cultivated a sense of humor, which helps me a lot!

I don't fight with age, but I make sure to stay in shape, take care of my skin and look good.

Who are your heroines in the art world?

Billie Holiday, because her magnificent voice translates all the feelings and produces an effect on me of resilience.

She was a very courageous woman, who faced racism and was able to impose her vision in the very misogynistic milieu of jazz musicians of the time.

And Joséphine Baker, an outstanding dancer and singer, who reminds me of destinies like that of my mother and of so many courageous black women.

You have been fighting since the 1990s against skin color discrimination in fashion.

Is there still a long way to go?

Yes.

It is all the same absurd, if you think about it, to fight for a skin color!

You don't wake up in the morning saying, "Here, I have white or black skin."

The color of the skin, we become aware of it through the eyes of the other.

I'm famous, but I've had to deal with negative reactions.

I am for diversity and inclusion, in fashion and in all walks of life.

This does not mean wanting the scales to tip one way or the other, but wanting there to be equality in the way sentient beings are treated.

I want people to see a black designer if they're talented.

This is why I encourage fashion to open up to African designers, like the young Nigerian Kenneth Ize.

I go regularly to Africa to discover visionary creators.

A fashion group today cannot define itself as global if it ignores fifty-four countries of a marvelous continent!

I am involved because Nelson Mandela told me that a vision without action is just a dream, but that by combining vision and action, we can really change the world.