Adwoa Aboah

I never would have dreamt in a million years that I would have young girls coming up to me at Glastonbury or on the streets of L.A., New York, London, and telling me how much GurlsTalk or seeing my picture in a magazine means to them, as a woman of colour.

How can our industry better represent the reality of our larger community and provide our next generation a proper example of what they see around them every single day? This representation should also look beyond race and include those of all body types, religion, sexuality, and gender identification.

I love being a mixed-race woman in 2017. I feel part of something big. There's this understanding that we're all in it together.

Gurls Talk is my baby. It's just about opening up a space within schools where we as women and girls can talk about whatever we want.

In private school, I definitely judged myself against the lighter-skinned girls. I wanted to have different hair. I wanted to fit in. I thought that was more beautiful.

The most amazing thing for me is when I open up a magazine and I see someone I could be friends with and looks, maybe, slightly like me. And I think that's the same with young girls. Because there needs to be diversity.

Vogue' should be about giving a voice to all different cultures.

Diversity can't be a fashionable thing: it should be here to stay.

What drew me to modeling was this idea of being independent.

I can't deal with waking up and being sad.

I came from a privileged background, which I am entirely grateful for, but it played a part in my feeling that I couldn't complain about my own emotions.

I knew that modeling could open doors, and I would be able to travel and forge my own path. Being able to support yourself is amazing, and I think that was one of the things that appealed to me, but I didn't want to be in front of the camera at first.