Dove, one of our favorite beauty brands and champion of female self-esteem, partnered with another fav, Shonda Rhimes, to bring “The Girl Collective” to life.
The one-day summit, held in Los Angeles, aimed to help over 200 young women from the local area recognize the societal stereotypes placed on women through gender stereotypes, body image, negative representations and through several breakout sessions, panel discussions and hands-on activities, they taught the attendees how to combat those obstacles in their everyday life.
PHOTO: Madame Noire
One stand out speaker during the event was SZA; the singer opened up about her body transformation over the years and how she has come to accept that she is an ever-growing being.
“I think there are a lot of standards that people told me about that I didn’t see. I started, I was 190 pounds, I only wore my dad’s big t-shirts and socks on stage, no shoes, and didn’t even notice; never complained or tripped about my makeup.”
SZA's carefree style never set off any alarms for her team and in fact, SZA said her manager let her be herself.
“Honestly, my manager, Punch, never asked me to ‘get dressed’ once. People would come to him like, ‘we need to clean her up,’ and he would say, ‘It’s fine. She’s fine.’”
PHOTO: XONecole
Now-a-days, SZA’s style is one that is looked to on the red carpets as the “it-factor” but it has some people questioning what sparked the changes but the CTRL artist says she was just in a space of change and we can all relate to that.
“It was just a matter of where I was in my mind, but I did also come out of that space where I was like, I feel like I want to change. I want to be different. I want to grow. I want to learn. I think it’s one thing to be comfortable, but then it’s one thing to not see your full potential and your full picture. The standard should really come [from] within.”
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