Adesuwa Aighewi likes to joke that she hasn’t done much but in reality she has done much more. She's been on the covers of MFF and L'Officiel Paris, w
Adesuwa Aighewi likes to joke that she hasn’t done much but in reality she has done much more. She’s been on the covers of MFF and L’Officiel Paris, walked for the likes of Mara Hoffman, Dior, Gucci, Chanel, Coach, Kenzo, DKNY, Alexander Wang, Louis Vuitton, Kate Spade, Miu Miu, Bottega Venta, Marc Jacobs, Michael Kors, Prabal Gurung, Fendi, Tommy Hilfiger, Vivienne Westwood, Sophie Theallet and Yeezy (Seasons 2, 3, and 4), as well as appeared in editorials for Vogue, i-D, NYLON, Office and Pop. She even played Donald Glover’s love interest in his 2011 music video for song ‘Heartbeat,’ and had a role in Diana Gordon’s (formerly known as Wynter Gordon) music video, ‘Woman’ last year. She was also featured in British Vogue as one of the breakout models for London Fashion week’s autumn/winter 2018 season.
She is a one-of-a-kind beauty of Nigerian, Chinese and Thai descent. The second of four children; two girls and two boys, all of who look identical, but with different hair types, Adesuwa Aighewi grew up in Africa but moved a lot. Her father is from Edo State in Nigeria while her mum is a Thai-born Chinese. Her life as a model began when she was discovered on her college campus in Maryland where she was studying Chemistry, expectedly as he parents are both environmental scientists. Naturally, she didn’t take modeling serious, neither did her parents especially as they were very traditional in their ways. She thought she would end up being a doctor or a diplomat and work for the UN. And that got her to combine the two; modeling and schooling. But fate had other things in stock for her. She ended up leaving school to pursue modelling full-time and currently shuttles between New York and Los Angeles, working with agencies in every major city.
Adesuwa Aighewi considers the glory that comes with modelling as what she likes about the career but she however doesn’t think she would want to model forever. She plans to do documentaries that would change the way people view Africa in the nearest future and hopes that her visibility, dedicated industry following and willingness to speak her mind will help her accomplish just that. And in honour of her late brother who died as a teenager, Adesuwa Aighewi plans to release a children’s book titled ‘Akugbe’ which tells the story of a young masquerader who got lost during a parade in Nigeria and spends a year trying to find its way home.
A multi talented model who is gradually tilting towards activism, she recently announced a partnership with ACLU foundation, a legal and advocacy organization and RE/DONE, a US clothing brand, to design a line of hooded sweatshirts to promote freedom of speech and equality.
