Think of the color nude. It’s a soft, delicate shade that blends rather than yells, like those robust reds and ?obnoxious oranges.
It is not calming like a deep indigo or a forest green, but blank, like an untouched canvas.
Its creamy base of yellows and whites with brown undertones make you think of the color your latte turns once the whipped cream has dissolved.
Its synonyms are flesh or skin.
And it’s a lie.
When used to describe a color, nude makes an automatic association to other words like nudity, neutral and naked. Needless to say, the word itself makes you think of skin tone.
I’m going to be quite blunt with you here: not everyone has the same skin tone. The “flesh” color you just imagined in your head probably only describes the skin of someone who is white.
For an industry that claims to know colors, the fashion world fails to understand how limiting it is to describe off-white beige as “nude.”
This exclusive category of color bars people who would never use the peach, originally “flesh” but renamed in 1962, Crayon to draw a self-portrait.
I would grit my teeth whenever I worked my summer job and had to sell “nude” bras that would match only the complexion of someone like Emma Stone to women of all races.
Many times the reaction when I showed our limited selection to any woman who wasn’t pasty white would be a wrinkled nose and the following question: “Do you have any other neutral colors?”
I shook my head sadly every time.
I distinctly remember the moment I recognized the privilege “nude” gives to white women like myself. In my junior year of high school, I was in my marching band’s color guard.
The costumes that year for the flag twirlers were fitted purple dresses with sparkles galore.
Think Rapunzel’s dress from “Tangled” but flashier.
To attain the elegance required for said outfit, our guard instructor ordered every single girl a “nude” bodysuit with a built-in leotard to wear underneath.
Out of ignorance or maybe just carelessness, he forgot four women on the guard squad were black.
When I wore the undergarment, its creamy texture blended with my pale complexion to make me look like an oversized fetus. It was ugly, but it got the job done.
When these women wore the bodysuit, they looked like they were wearing beige overalls.
Each time they moved the skirt of their dresses during the show, they didn’t reveal a faux flash of leg as intended, but instead showed what appeared to be socked feet.
To add icing on top of an already disastrous cake, we had “nude” shoes to complement the outfit.
Each one of these ladies vocalized the stupidity of wearing something meant to blend in that did the exact opposite.
“Nude” should not be treated as a color that fits people of a certain mold.
In 2013, Christian Louboutin revealed a line of pumps to accommodate a range of different skin tones for women.
Though this was rather innovative and progressive on the company’s part, I don’t know many women who can afford $675 heels.
This issue extends beyond the fashion world.
Frankly, I would love to hear from Johnson & Johnson why they can make Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Band-Aids but they can’t make “flesh”-colored Band-Aids for anyone who’s not Caucasian.
It’s time we threw out concepts like “nude” that attempt to whitewash the rainbow and accommodate people of all races.
Otherwise, we’ll live in a world that’s bland.
maehogan@indiana.edu
