Top 10 Most Controversial Fashion Ads of All Time

A fifteen-year-old Brooke Shields delivered a suggestive tagline that was banned from television but made Calvin Klein the most talked-about brand in America, establishing the template for fashion's exploitation of youth and sexuality in advertising.

Oliviero Toscani's digitally altered images of the Pope kissing an Egyptian imam and Obama kissing Chávez drew Vatican condemnation and diplomatic protests, continuing Benetton's tradition of using shock to sell knitwear.

Videos showing a Chinese model struggling to eat pizza and pasta with chopsticks were denounced as racist, forcing cancellation of a massive Shanghai show and costing D&G an estimated one billion dollars in Chinese market revenue.

Gucci's eight-hundred-dollar turtleneck sweater featuring a pull-up mouth covering with oversized red lips evoked blackface imagery so clearly that the brand hired its first global head of diversity after the worldwide backlash.

Mario Testino's photograph of a model with the Gucci G shaved into her pubic hair pushed fashion advertising into territory so explicit that multiple countries banned it outright while it simultaneously became one of the most discussed ads of the decade.

H&M photographed a Black child model wearing a green hoodie reading "Coolest Monkey in the Jungle," demonstrating such a catastrophic failure of editorial oversight that stores were vandalized in South Africa and The Weeknd severed his brand partnership.

Benetton-owned Sisley ran images of models appearing to snort lines of white fabric like cocaine, with the tagline "Fashion Junkie," glamorizing drug abuse so blatantly that the campaign was pulled after universal condemnation from health organizations.

The London Underground ads featuring a bikini model asking "Are You Beach Body Ready?" provoked a feminist petition signed by seventy thousand people and were ultimately banned by the advertising standards authority for body-shaming.

Zara's body-positive campaign featuring exclusively thin models in skinny jeans with the slogan "Love Your Curves" was mocked globally as tone-deaf performative inclusivity from a brand whose largest in-store size excluded most women.

A fifteen-year-old Brooke Shields delivered a suggestive tagline that was banned from television but made Calvin Klein the most talked-about brand in America, establishing the template for fashion's exploitation of youth and sexuality in advertising.

Oliviero Toscani's digitally altered images of the Pope kissing an Egyptian imam and Obama kissing Chávez drew Vatican condemnation and diplomatic protests, continuing Benetton's tradition of using shock to sell knitwear.

Videos showing a Chinese model struggling to eat pizza and pasta with chopsticks were denounced as racist, forcing cancellation of a massive Shanghai show and costing D&G an estimated one billion dollars in Chinese market revenue.

Gucci's eight-hundred-dollar turtleneck sweater featuring a pull-up mouth covering with oversized red lips evoked blackface imagery so clearly that the brand hired its first global head of diversity after the worldwide backlash.

Mario Testino's photograph of a model with the Gucci G shaved into her pubic hair pushed fashion advertising into territory so explicit that multiple countries banned it outright while it simultaneously became one of the most discussed ads of the decade.

H&M photographed a Black child model wearing a green hoodie reading "Coolest Monkey in the Jungle," demonstrating such a catastrophic failure of editorial oversight that stores were vandalized in South Africa and The Weeknd severed his brand partnership.

Benetton-owned Sisley ran images of models appearing to snort lines of white fabric like cocaine, with the tagline "Fashion Junkie," glamorizing drug abuse so blatantly that the campaign was pulled after universal condemnation from health organizations.

The London Underground ads featuring a bikini model asking "Are You Beach Body Ready?" provoked a feminist petition signed by seventy thousand people and were ultimately banned by the advertising standards authority for body-shaming.

Zara's body-positive campaign featuring exclusively thin models in skinny jeans with the slogan "Love Your Curves" was mocked globally as tone-deaf performative inclusivity from a brand whose largest in-store size excluded most women.