It’s Milan Fashion Week and Gigi and Bella Hadid arrived yesterday and have been photographed several times on their way to and from fittings. Bella is there with her boyfriend, Marc Kalman. Gigi is travelling with her one-and-a-half year old daughter, Khai.
What makes this especially newsworthy is that, well, the last time Gigi was in Milan for Fashion Week was back in September last year – I even posted abouther travel steeze at the time. About a month later, though, is when news broke about an alleged altercation between Zayn Malik and Gigi’s mother, Yolanda. And the incident happened when Gigi was working in Milan.
Gigi and Zayn are no longer together. After taking the family dispute public for a few days, all parties ended up shutting it down – obviously the right decision – and there’s been little to no gossip about the situation since.
Now Gigi is back in Milan, this time bringing Khai along and the thing is, it’s not like Gigi can’t afford childcare, but even when you’re a celebrity and you have the money and the resources, well, as most mothers can probably understand, sometimes you just feel like what’s best for you and your child is to have your child with you. Of course Gigi has the kind of job where this is possible and that’s certainly a privilege, but it’s still probably not easy. Easier, sure, than most, but not easy. At the same time, though, and please correct me if you think this is the wrong way of seeing it, I find it empowering.
Gigi works in an industry that in its own way hasn’t been all that manageable for mothers. It used to be that as soon as a model became a mother, the opportunities would slow down – and the environment wasn’t set up to comfortably accommodate those who did have the option to keep posing and walking the runway. She’s obviously finding a way to do it. With help, of course, and that is definitely an advantage she has over not only many of her less well-known peers and non-celebrity parents. But can we jump off from this and ask why it’s not a more common option in other workplaces, particularly corporate workplaces? I mean if we want to keep women in the workforce…
