lifestyle

Your new ad is so excellent, DJs. We have another brilliant idea for you.

I never thought I’d say it.

An advert has taken me to a happy place.

A sublime place, where Adam Goodes is wearing a tux and Kanye is rapping and beautiful girls are flying through the air and rock god Tim Rogers looks like Everything in a sharp suit, and the whole clip is overspilling energy, attitude and complete and utter awesomeness.

Here it is:

Video via David Jones

It’s for David Jones, and I am reaching for my wallet.

Sell me something, DJs, I am in. Towels? Knickers? Those $5 chocolate strawberries in the basement? Just sell me something. I AM SO IN.

Diversity is a word that’s thrown about a great deal at the moment. Why isn’t TV more diverse? Why aren’t Grammy winners more diverse? Why isn’t our media more diverse? Why aren’t the bodies on the red carpet more diverse?

We’re tired of everything looking the same. We want the people in the culture we consume to reflect our lives – multi-coloured, multi-aged, multi-sized.

Fashion is an industry that seems to struggle with this the most. For decades and decades, there has been one size, one shape, one way to be beautiful if you are on a catwalk, or indeed, in a department store campaign. Usually that involves being under 20 and difficult to spot in low-light.

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Like the all-white beautiful young people of THIS David Jones ad, circa 2012.

Video via David Jones

But here’s an ad, for FASHION, that deliberately, willfully, makes nods to diversity. That actually went out of its way to do so.

Adam Goodes is a national treasure – a proud indigenous man who has weathered abuse with unwaivering dignity. He agreed to be an ambassador for DJs because he will advise the store on reconciliation and social justice. He was the kind of bold choice that brands rarely make – a man who stands for something, but is not universally loved. He also looks excellent in a tux.

Tim Rogers is 46. He is a skinny, bonafide rock god of the 90s and noughties, and again, not an obvious choice for a fashion brand who are more usually associated with eastern suburbs matrons, floral displays and wooden puppets creaking in Christmas windows.

So, bravo, DJs. Thank you for not being boring. Thank you for that.

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One suggestion though. And it’s (whisper it) About The Women.

Models Jessica Gomes and Tahnee Atkinson (yup, from Top Model) are so gorgeous they makes me want to grab a spoon. Sydney dance company performer Juliette Barton is fierce in her flexibility and strength, as is the astonishingly good-looking pole-vaulter and model Amy Pejkovic. They are all worthy choices to transmit your messages of Confidence, Strength and Elation.

DJs-celebrities-jpg
The new David Jones ambassadors. Pass me a spoon. Image: David Jones.
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But next time, DJs, what about some women who – like Goodes and Rogers – represent the sort of faces you don’t usually see in a clothes advertisement.

There’s something so very, very safe about beautiful young women in lingerie. If we are ready for indigenous activist footballers and wiry middle-aged musos (and we are! We are!), is it too much to ask that we might also be ready for a woman over 35? Or over a size 8?

Just an idea, DJs.

I will really go nuts on those chocolate strawberries if you could deliver on that one.

Do you like the new DJs ad? 

You can follow Holly on Facebook, here

Check out some of David Jones’ ambassadors from over the years. Post continues after gallery. 

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