She was called the Queen of Ebony Fashion Fair. She is also credited with giving Ebony magazine its name.
Eunice Johnson, who was the wife of the late John H. Johnson, founder and publisher of Ebony and Jet magazine, showed the world the beauty of black women.
She was the creative force behind the cosmetics line, Ebony Fashion Fair, and its traveling fashion show with featured black models who sashayed and danced down the runway. The show brought high fashion to black communities all over the country.
Johnson, who was an important leader in black fashion and journalism, died of renal failure on Jan. 3, 2010. She was 93.
In this Aug. 15, 2005 file photo, former President Bill Clinton escorts Eunice Johnson, widow of Ebony magazine founder John Johnson, center, into the Rockefeller Memorial Chapel in Chicago for her husband's funeral. On Sunday, Jan. 3, 2010, Eunice Johnson died according to the Chicago-based Johnson Publishing Company. She was 93. Eunice Johnson is credited with naming Ebony magazine. Her daughter, Linda Johnson Rice, now heads the publishing company. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson, File)
Robin Givhan, Fashion Editor of The Washington Post, said Johnson’s Ebony Fashion Fair runway show allowed black models and their audience to be proud of their heritage.
“It was really an opportunity for them to define themselves in the way that they believed that they could be when I think in some ways society didn’t see them beyond a very specific stereotype,” Givhan said during a recent interview with the National Public Radio (NPR).
She also spoke about how Johnson will be remembered.
“I think she’ll be remembered as someone who let the fashion industry know that the African-American community is incredibly viable as an audience, that it has a lot of creative spirit, and I think that she’ll also be remembered for someone who reminded African-Americans to take great confidence and pride in themselves,” Givhan said. “And I think that’s no less of a legacy than the fact that she told, you know, these Parisian designers that yeah, you should pay attention to my people.”
The Remembering Eunice Johnson by Haven Magazine, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
