page_title: Donyale Luna
section_title: Move to London
hierarchical_section_title: Donyale Luna / Modeling career / Move to London
caption_attribution_description: English: An artist's rendition of the March 1966 Vogue UK cover of Donyale Luna, originally shot by David Bailey, who was the first African American on a major print publication cover.
context_page_description: Peggy Anne Donyale Aragonea Peugot Luna, better known as Donyale Luna, was an American supermodel and actress who gained popularity in Western Europe during the late 1960s, generally cited as “the first black supermodel”, Luna was the first African American model to appear on the cover of the British edition of Vogue, in March 1966. She entered modeling in a period which favoured 'white passing models' and has been described as 'the first black model who really began to change things; to enable more diverse beauty paradigms to break through.' She is known to have been a covergirl 11 times between 1965 - 1975.
  She appeared in several underground films like the screen tests of Andy Warhol, and had roles in Qui êtes-vous, Polly Maggoo?, and most notably as Enotea in the 1969 Federico Fellini film Fellini Satyricon as well as Otto Preminger's Skidoo in the role of 'God's Mistress'.
context_section_description: Arriving in December 1965, London proved to be where Luna would make her name as a model, emerging in Swinging London, part of a youth cultural revolution associated with Beatlemania and in fashion Mary Quants miniskirts (see second wave feminism), the stylised-bobs of Vidal Sassoon, Mods, Teddy Boys and bright colours and patterns and fashions like those sold in shops like Barbara Hulanickis Biba or seen in the street culture of Carnaby Street or Chelsea. She was photographed in London by David Bailey, William Klein, Helmut Newton, Charlotte March (image in infobox, above) and William Claxton. Keen to join the London arts scene, she would become friends with Mick Jagger, Julie Christie, Micheal Caine, Iain Quarrier and Yul Brynner. She rented an apartment by the Thames and bought a pet Maltese dog she named 'Christianne'.
  She became the first African-American model to appear on the cover of any Vogue magazine, the March 1966 British issue, shot by photographer David Bailey, only months after arriving in London. Bailey described her as "extraordinary-looking, so tall and skinny, ... She was like an illustration, a walking illustration." Shooting her for the cover he noted "I didn't care what she was – she could have been a fucking Martian for all I cared." He thought the editorial staff at Vogue House were happy about using a black model but states that “the sales people always had a problem [with using her]." She was chosen by Beatrix Miller, the-then British Vogue editor for "her bite and personality", also describing her as "[happening] to be a marvellous shape ... All sort of angular and immensely strange and tall". The shot composition was inspired by Spanish surrealist Picasso's ocular-centric portraiture with 'one of Luna's eyes peered suggestively from between her fingers'. She was wearing a Chloé dress and Mimi de N earrings in the shot. In the editorial images she was dressed in Christian Dior silk tunics, Mod dresses by Pierre Cardin and a silver Yves Saint Laurent dress.
  In popular internet lore such as on blogs, it has been speculated that the shot was angled so "Luna's face, most notably her lips and nose, are ... obscured on her British Vogue cover, also somewhat hiding her race" a proponent of featurism coded in privilege and Eurocentric beauty standards. However, in 2019 her family revealed the shot was chosen as "a single heavily lined eye ... visible through her fingers, which form a V for Vogue".
  She was shot, by Charlotte March, for a jewelry spread in the German magazine Twen of March 1966. Fellow model and friend Pat Cleveland noted "she had no tits, but lots of presence, we'd walk down the street and men's mouths would drop open in awe. When we walked into restaurants people would stop eating and stand up and applaud. She was like a mirage, or some kind of fantasy." She also went on to work for French Vogue. Bethann Hardison stated of Luna that "no one looked like her. She was like a really extraordinary species." Time magazine in an article titled "The Luna Year" (1966), described her as: "a new heavenly body who, because of her striking singularity, promises to remain on high for many a season. Donyale Luna, as she calls herself, is unquestionably the hottest model in Europe at the moment. She is only 20, a Negro, hails from Detroit, and is not to be missed if one reads Harper's Bazaar, Paris Match, Britain's Queen, the British, French or American editions of Vogue." She also appeared in London Life, a monthly fashion magazine, in a shoot as a shop window display model at a Wallis department store in London. 
  In April she appeared again in Vogue UK shot by David Bailey in a feature called This Summer's dancing patterns in mod styled luxury brands. She then appeared on the cover of Harper's Bazaar UK in June 1966, her features and skin colour had not been edited out in this cover, shot by Bill King. In the October 15 edition of British Vogue, she was featured in a Klein shoot with Audrey Hepburn. 
  In 1967 the world-leading fiberglass mannequin designer Adel Rootstein released a model based on Lun
caption: An artists rendition of the March 1966 cover
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