KARACHI: Harper’s Bazaar Arabia kicks off the new year with Saudi-Pakistani supermodel Shanina Shaik on its first 2020 cover.
Revealed on Dec. 23, the magazine features an interview with Shaik on identity, belonging and how she has been “trying to find a place in the industry” with her Saudi, Pakistani, Lithuanian and Australian family background.
“They said I was never going to be a high-fashion model and that I’d never do runways,” she told Harper’s Bazaar Arabia. “Agents, clients … they all told me the same thing. I would go to castings and never get the jobs that I wanted, and it really affected me, especially as so much of it was because I look so mixed.”
She recalls that only six years ago she would go to castings in Europe, and would be turned away because of her skin color.
As she spoke about her Saudi-Pakistani descent, she expressed a desire to make 2020 the year when she finally will get to visit her father’s homeland, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
“I’ve never been there before but I have family there and have such a strong bond and affinity with Middle Eastern cultures. It’s from my dad’s side,” Shaik said, adding that although she has learnt a lot about different cultures, it is her fathers that she would “naturally enjoy the most.”