Wow, Vogue really did Gigi Hadid dirty with this cover, right? Gigi covers the March issue of Vogue, her first magazine cover since welcoming her daughter Khai last September. I would imagine that for a model, the “first photoshoot back” is one of the most sensitive ones, and I would imagine that Vogue would have tried to make a new mom look voluptuous and earth-mothery. Instead, Vogue gave her harsh makeup, bad lighting, a tragic center part, weird neck shadows and a dress which looks like a bloody sheet. Offensively bad, my God. That being said, the interview is surprisingly good. Gigi talks at length about her pregnancy, her labor, her first months as a mom and her dreams for her daughter’s future.
Having a home birth with no drugs: “What I really wanted from my experience was to feel like, Okay, this is a natural thing that women are meant to do. I had to dig deep. I knew it was going to be the craziest pain in my life, but you have to surrender to it and be like, ‘This is what it is.’ I loved that. There definitely was a point where I was like, I wonder what it would be like with an epidural, how it would be different. My midwife looked at me and was like, ‘You’re doing it. No one can help you. You’re past the point of the epidural anyway, so you’d be pushing exactly the same way in a hospital bed.’”
Zayn caught the baby. “It didn’t even click that she was out. I was so exhausted, and I looked up and he’s holding her. It was so cute.”
She’s not looking to have another baby any time soon: “I know my mom and Zayn and Bella were proud of me, but at certain points I saw each of them in terror. Afterward, Z and I looked at each other and were like, We can have some time before we do that again.”
Zayn bought a farm adjacent to the Hadid family farm in PA: “We’re still close by but we have our space to be our own little family….I always want to be here full-time. I love the city, but this is where I’m happiest.”
Deciding to shoot a Vogue cover 10 weeks postpartum: “I know that I’m not as small as I was before, but I also am a very realistic thinker. I straight up was like, ‘Yeah, I’ll shoot a Vogue cover, but I’m obviously not going to be a size 0,’ nor do I, at this point, feel like I need to be back to that. I also think it’s a blessing of this time in fashion that anyone who says that I have to be that can suck it.”
Raising Khai to understand her multifaith family: “My dad’s Muslim, and my mom grew up celebrating Christmas. I felt like I was allowed to learn about every religion when I was a kid. I think it’s good to take different pieces of different religions that you connect with, and I think that’s how we’ll do that… My brother, when he was in elementary school, someone said to him, ‘Your dad’s a terrorist,’ because that was after 9/11. I think that [Zayn and I] both want our daughter to understand fully all of her background—and also we want to prepare her. If someone does say something to her at school, we want to give her the tools to understand why other kids would do that and where that comes from.”
Throughout the piece, Gigi is mostly having a conversation with herself about how she wants to stay in this bubble she’s created for herself in Pennsylvania, on the adjacent farms of her family and Zayn. She sounds like she’s had a lovely quarantine on the farm, honestly, with the added bonus of being blissed out with the baby and all of that. So, yeah, I don’t know if Gigi will ever go back to modeling full time. She doesn’t want to leave the farm.
I also loved what she said about having a Muslim father, and being with a man who was raised Muslim. As the product of a multi-faith family, she’s right that the best way to approach raising Khai is to expose her to all sides of her family and give her the information early, info about Islam and Christianity and, who knows, probably Buddhism too.
Cover courtesy of Vogue, IGs courtesy of Gigi Hadid.
How and why is she considered a supermodel????
I have the same question.
The same question popped up when I saw that cover.
And omg that bloody sheet dress is what I was thinking… how did they miss that! Or was it deliberate?
Amazing how far nepotism can take you.
This. I’m old, but I love the days of Christy, Linda and Naomi. Those ladies were breathtaking. That said, the interview was pretty good, but the cover is just awful.
Agreed. the same goes for Bella, the amount of plastic surgery she has had is unreal. I’d take a Daria Werbowy or Erin Wasson over these girls any day.
She has an extremely recognizable and pretty face. I think she makes sense as a supermodel. Her sister has obvious plastic surgery, so that one makes far less sense to me.
Excuse me? Pardon you? When you look at the uniquely gorgeous and recognizable faces of The 1990s original supermodels, namely, Naomi Campbell, Linda Evangelista, Cindy Crawford, Kate Moss, Claudia Schiffer, Noémie Lenoir, Jelena Hadid’s face is médiocre in comparison. And none of the 1990s supermodels had had plastic surgery done. I believe Gisele Bundchen was the irretrievable turning point between those genuine beauties and the average-looking overeachers that currently boast the title.
Worst pics I’ve ever seen of her.
It’s the overall coloring that is doing her no favors. So many ash tones & a bloody sheet of a dress? Oye. Kind of ominous when it should be happier?
Can we collectively fire Anna Wintour? Or at least get a new EiC and just get Wintour out of that spot?
I have a soft spot for Gigi and I’m glad she’s doing well.
This. I used to defend her because I liked having someone other than “youth! youth! youth!” but she has done a series of people dirty and has just run that magazine into the ground. I used to love reading Vogue because there was a lot of substance once you got past the ads but now there’s not much to read. It makes spending $7 or whatever it is now a ridiculous over spend.
I genuinely can’t remember the last time I was impressed by anything Anna Wintour did.
I always roll my eyes with Gigi. You can tell she was raised to know she’s rich and will never need to work for anything because some of her comments are so out of touch. I especially love the comment where she says she can say a F you to the fashion industry if they don’t like her post baby body, which happens to look just as tiny as before. Because she purposely made her body as tiny as possible to fit the mold years ago, a chance none of the rest of us plebeians would have since we don’t have rich families backing us.
´Because she purposely made her body as tiny as possible to fit the mold years ago´- what do you mean? That she used plastic sugery to get thin? If not, I don´t quite get how having a rich family can help you to lose pregnancy weight? Sure, a private trainer and cook helps, but she still needs to put in the hours herself, I would imagine.
I thought you meant something else, that she´s extremily priviledged in the sense that she doesn´t HAVE to work because she´s rich already, and can therefore afford to ´say a F you to the fashion industry´. Easy for her to say, most models don´t have that luxury.
Nah I’m sorry, my tired mind messed that up. That is to a degree what I meant as well. She also had a fuller body when she first got started as a model (she looked great, honestly), and she was given a lot of chances that a regular person that size wouldn’t. She then lost a ton of weight, pretended she had a thyroid issue. If she didn’t have connections, she wouldn’t have been given that chance to lose weight. It’s also annoying that she DID lose weight, conformed to those standards, but now is pretending to say F you to them.
Re: ´Nah I’m sorry, my tired mind messed that up.´ Understood! Hope you´re ok!
Claiming to have an illness is a very popular excuse for dramatic weight loss. Not to say this is the case 100% of the time. Just that it is used as an excuse to stop questions or concerns.
Both girls looked healthy and thin before diving deep into modeling. Their hair and nails were lovely. Skin was evenly toned. Then… the modeling world. Which you can argue is a disease in itself.
Early in the pandemic I shame watched every episode of RHOBH (and RHONY) that were on Hulu. From what I can remember, Yolanda (GiGi’s mom) really pushed her into modeling and was very controlling over what she ate. I’d be shocked if she didn’t have some form of disordered eating patterns.
And while I agree that she’s been raised in a bubble of privilege, I can’t really harsh on her because she seems sweet and harmless enough. And if my memories of the show are correct, she seemed like a go with the flow type. I wonder if she would have even gone into modeling if Yolanda hadn’t been the model equivalent of a stage mom.
@Lexy – she was diagnosed with Hashimoto’s disease (underactive thyroid) some years ago and one of the many symptoms is weight gain and bloating of the face and neck. That may be the reason why she looked heavier early on in her career before she got treatment for it.
Cherry, she doesn’t work a 9 to 5 like WE do so of course it’s easy least to maintain her small figure. I am not impressed.
You know, I used to watch the Real Housewives when her mom was on the show. Gigi was still a teenager, way before her modeling days. She was trying to break in to modeling. One episode showed Gigi calling her Mom, saying she was hungry. Her Mom told her she should not eat, she had to be thin if she was going to make it! I was shocked, saddened, but that is how these people think. I would never, ever say that to my daughter, but then again, I am not a “Dance Mom” or anything like that, we value education and intelligence at home!
Jaded- At the start of her modeling career, she was still thin! Just normal people thin. She wasn’t bloated, just looked natural. She was an athlete, and she looked healthy. Fast forward to now- there’s no way the weight she was at before she became pregnant was her natural size. She was very tiny, and her face was drooping from losing so much weight. I don’t believe her diagnosis, because how convenient she was treated right after designers were telling her she was too “big” to be on the runway.
@Lexy This. That family lies very easily about this kind of stuff. I think Gigi’s initial goals were to be a Guess model like her mom and an Angel. Once she realized nepotism could get her into the high fashion world she dropped the weight and got rid of those awful implants.
@heather I believe what her mother told her was actually “eat an almond”
But basically yes, didn’t allow her to eat.
The whole family lies. Her mom even sad Gigi and Bella never had anything put into their body, nor used fillers or botox. It’s laughable. Even if Gigi has thyroid problems she was skinny before she lost all that weight and the thyroid issues were diagnosed long after she dropped all the weight. You don’t suddenly lose weight when you take thyroid hormones. You just stop gaining it. You need to lose it the same way everyone else does.
Initially, I tried to give birth naturally. Thank god I was in the hospital because we wouldn’t be alive if we did’t have the c-section option available to us. Her story is cute but saying that ‘this is a natural thing that women are meant to do’ about natural birth although I understand it, it really grates me.
Especially since it ignores the fact that nature doesn’t need *all* of us to get through safely, just *enough* of us. (Turns out I had a huge mass that would have prevented the vaginal exit of any child of mine without that first c-section and removal of said mass). So yeah that’s what our bodies are built to do, but it doesn’t always have to be successful.
You know, if I were one of these celebs who thinks everything always goes peachy and pretty and empowering, I would give heavily to those non profits that work to get educated midwives in poor places and some technology, as well as to the places that help repair fistulas. MANY girls give birth in various places when their bodies are too young to birth and fistulas are just one of the kinds of damage that they have to live with. Not that there isn’t surgery to correct them, but they don’t live in the places where the surgery is accessible.
Also – I use “vaginal” and “unmedicated.” I don’t like the judgment inherent in “natural.”
This! I had a friend that when filling out paperwork on her child, one of the questions asked about delivery. The options were “Normal” and “C-Section”. I’d never get offended by the word vagina in the first place, but in their attempts to not offend anyone with a word, the managed to be even more offensive.
THIS! I had an emergency c-section because my body wasn’t doing what it was “meant to do.” Sometimes things go wrong, and medical intervention is necessary.
@ Jen : I remember reading this line once about “natural” childbirth. The person said “hurricanes and earthquakes are natural – but that doesn’t make them a good thing”.
I hate that some women are shamed for wanting to have the option of using pain medication during childbirth.
Yeah. Gigi’s narrative about home births is very dangerous. Since this is a touchy subject for me, I’ll just see myself out.
In Canada, at least, midwives are regulated medical professionals. They are experts in low-risk pregnancy and birth. Mothers with midwives are monitored and supported throughout pregnancy and labour. If complications arise, midwives consult with physicians or, if necessary, transfer a client’s care to a physician. Mothers who work with midwives can choose to give birth in a hospital, at home or at a birthing centre. I can’t speak to other places, because I don’t know about them. So, in Canada at least midwifery is a regulated, science-based profession.
If “natural” means entirely without medical intervention, then a home birth with midwives is NOT “natural,” because midwifery is based on science.
Also, the notion the midwives and home births are somehow inherently unsafe is incorrect.
Home births with professional midwives are safe.
To give her a tiny benefit of the doubt, maybe she just meant that she’s doing something that countless of women have done before her, so getting through the pain is possible. I know I psyched myself up a bit in labor with that thought.
On the other hand, I am totally on board with getting rid of the idea that there is only one “natural” way to give birth. It’s crap, it’s judgy, it’s created by an industry trying to sell us crap and sell us concepts that sell more crap. Every birth is a natural one.
We have to use the less offensive terminology or Speak with compassion for all choices or options. It’s great to feel proud of your choice and experience, but we should be mindful a lot of women feel shame because they couldn’t deliver as easily or as they wanted like she Gigi could and did. She doesn’t come off as trying to offend, but this is such a sensitive topic and she seems disconnected from anything, but her own experience in her Vogue cover article.
Omg – SAME!
My water broke prematurely, and I gave birth 24 hours later. I got a lot of medication (both to start contractions, to open the cervix and to relieve the pain, because the process was so lengthy). The entire thing took so long, and because I was in pain for such a long time, the doctors were like: take it. It will speed the process. They gave me the epidural, but it was too late to have an effect. I began pushing 5 minutes afterwards.
But when I read this, I’m like: honey… don’t sugarcoat things. And it is perfectly fine to have an epidural, gas or whatever! I certainly don’t feel ashamed.
I really wish celebrities would stop talking about home births and drug-free births publicly because they have a lot of influence over young women who are only hearing these idealized stories and not so many stories of how easily things can go wrong and fast.
After watching that ricki lake home birth documentary I definitely had an idealized version of a “natural” home birth and was all ready to find a doula to sToP tHe UnNeCeSsArY mEdIcAl iNtErVeNtIoNs. Then I learned early on I had placenta previa and it never moved which means had I done it the “natural” way I would have been one of the many women throughout history to die in childbirth.
So my perspective on having a c-section was immeasurable relief and gratitude that we have the medical resources that allowed me to give birth safely. I wish for all pregnant women to hear more of those stories so that they don’t feel scared of a hospital or like they had a lesser birth experience if they had a c-section. What is important is having a living healthy baby and mama when it’s all done.
It’s also a false narrative. Humans are the mammals with the highest birth complication rates and the highest pain while giving birth. Our hips are actually too small to birth children that large. That’s why they come out kind of premature. Otherwise there wouldn’t even be a way out through the birth canal.
Gigi normally photographs beautifully, so once again US Vogue is doing someone dirty! I don’t understand it. Anyways, I’m very happy for Gigi and Zayn and am totally jealous of their little farm life in PA. It sounds so nice.
This is the most refreshingly honest celebrity birth story I’ve ever read, “i regretted not having an epidural and my family was terrified” 😂
Selma Blair, Kiera knightly and Amy Schumer To name a few all told very honest accounts of their birthing experiences. This comes off as almost a Disney version in comparison.
Something whimsical and natural – Gigi with her windswept, natural wavy hair sitting by some hay – would have been lovely. This is Halloween horror story with harsh makeup, hair and styling. ugh. There is a complete disconnect between the photos and the interview.
The photos she’s posted herself looking natural and happy at home are far better than this harsh studio mess.
agree
Yeah I had an epidural after nearly 20 hours of labor. I was so set on it being a natural birth but I just wasn’t budging. At the final hour, they basically said epidural or C-section and I chose the epidural. I still don’t think most women are fully prepared for birth or fully educated by their Obgyn about all their options, at least I wasn’t. The focus was just on breastfeeding and what happens after the birth, not before and during. These pictures are terrible all the way around! Clothes, styling. Ugh.
OBs don’t do education like that.
24 years ago with my first, at childbirth class, we were told that we could make a plan, but to know that plans have a way of being upended, and to be open to whatever occurred- best advice I’ve ever been given.
That birth ended up with a failed (ascended) epidural which came close to requiring intubation (100%NRB), resulting in fetal distress and vacuum extraction. She spent the night in NICU, but all was well, and I’ve never had ill feelings about that whole process. I was just happy we both made it.
When my subsequent pregnancy with twins revealed baby closest to emergency exit was breech, I was offered the choice of starting vaginal… I said, nope! Section away! Luckily, that was a comparative piece of cake.
TL;DR- don’t plan on your birth plan.
I wish women in the public eye would talk more about the misogyny of medicine in the context of childbirth rather than how they gave birth as an individual.
But I guess maybe most women don’t have the opportunity to realize the misogyny inherent to medication in childbirth. It takes an extreme experience to really clarify that one. And we only ever get to read about these experiences that fall within the range of ‘normal’ as in, “I had pain that fell within a normal level, I had complications that fell within the realm of common or average,” etc.
Come again? Are you implying that epidurals are misogynist? Pitocin? Because without those two drugs, I would not have had two VBACs, full stop.
😆 whut?
Really bad photoshop on her arm in the pic with the blue dress. It looks like it’s withering away
This reads as incredibly entitled (no surprise). If she hadn’t commented on the COVID pandemic contributing to her decision to have a home birth you wouldn’t know there was a pandemic. She is living on a huge estate, all her close family is there, she doesn’t have to worry about working after having the baby and didn’t have to work during her pregnancy, she didn’t have any pregnancy complications and could birth at home… oh and she is so amazing that she doesn’t have a nanny or any extra help. Can you imagine? A mother who looks after her baby by herself (+numerous family members). What a star! Over all, the photos are horrible and the interview is incredibly tone deaf. There is no acknowledgement about what the rest of the country is going through. And I am sick of the “natural birth” shit. I’ve had five kids. Some with epidural some without. I felt like a beast delivering all 5! Oh. And I delivered during the pandemic with a mask and with just the health care team
Well round her up and call for the firing squad! Gigi should know better than to speak on her own experience ffs.
Yeah my British Vogue arrived this morning and I’m so happy that it’s my local version rather than the horrors Anna W is pushing for you over there. If anyone wants me I’ll be hanging out with Angie over a cup of tea.
The cover bloody sheet dress also looks too big on her to my eyes, so it’s like Vogue went out of their way to accommodate Gigi post-partum but also assumed she would be bigger. Baffling that they wouldn’t clip it.
Its the gathering of fabric at her left thumb causing the wrinkle that is making it look like that dress is not her size, does not fit her waist. Her left hand is compressing some of the fabric but it just looks like an ill fit.
How charming they kept the birthing sheet to make Mama a Vogue dress!
Yeah the baby was kind enough to strategically distribute the blood. Without crying.
Are we seriously just glossing over her stating that the baby was a week post due date, home birth specifically to get around hospital Covid protocol so that her internationally traveling sister could be in the room, and she has Hashimotos disease?? This sounds unnecessarily high risk and irresponsible. If she were going to give this many details about her private birth experience, you’d think she’d say something like “we are lucky enough to have fetal monitoring equipment and we felt very safe,” etc. I hope that people thinking this is some kind of super woman birth goals don’t actually take her “natural” example and instead follow medical recommendations.
What does Hashimoto’s disease have to do with this?
Women with Hashimoto’s syndrome can face potential complications including pre-eclampsia, anemia , miscarriage, placental abruption, and/or postpartum bleeding. The daughter of a friend of mine has it and had to have a c-section because the placenta covered her cervix and the umbilical cord was wrapped around the baby’s neck.
Ah I see, I thought the original post said that Bella had Hashimoto’s. I didn’t know that Gigi had Hashimoto’s or that it caused potential complications… so thanks!
Call me crazy but I think all women who’ve been pregnant and given birth deserve major props for their hard work, whether it was vaginal, c section, medicated or unmedicated. It’s all very hard work, extremely physically demanding and there’s no way to really prepare for it until it’s happening and it’s a rollercoaster. Plus the pressure of feeing so responsible for the life inside you. Wow it’s big stuff in my opinion and I think it gets lost how immense the experience is because it is so ordinary.
THANK YOU and I agree. That women just grow an entire other human (or two! or three!), an entire new organ, plus the uterus grows enormously. I didn’t find my c-section to be all that easy, despite it being a “planned emergent” so it wasn’t like I went through labor. I know some women sail through the whole thing, but it is work, it is a huge deal and it should be respected as such.
SIgh. I had a pretty “easy” natural home birth but I also recognize that this isn’t safe or possible for ALL women and that it’s not “what women are supposed to do.” That rubs me the wrong way. I also have access to healthy food, a safe home, could keep myself healthy, a midwife (that medicaid paid for and everything was 100% covered thanks to living in a state with Medicaid expansion and a progressive birth view) and time to read and educate myself. Not every woman has that opportunity. I think the US medical system is super f’ed up, especially in regards to childbirth and that women are mistreated as well but it’s not a black or white issue and I 100% don’t judge anyone for how they got a baby out of their body. She just comes across as so privileged and out of touch.
That horrible sheet dress looks like blood stains. And the straight, part in the middle hair style fad can leave anytime. Sorry. Been a long week.
I didn’t see a bloody sheet, but NOW…eeesh. Anyway, I’m liking the model on a cover 10 wks postpartum in a non-bounce back shot. She looks womanly & could have more color to her ashy face, but her body looks voluptuous & nice.
I’m very scared for the preg-o-rexic “bounce back” glorification. Happy this is slightly more natural?
The outfit and styling are dreadful. She is a pretty young woman. That being said, if not for nepotism, there is no way she would be a “ top model”
It looks like she’s wearing the sheet she just gave birth on