The Root Switches Up Its Fashion Awards
Vanessa De Luca, The Root’s editor in chief of one year, is looking to freshen up its annual style awards.
She’s evolving the G/O Media-owned site’s Glow Up 50 Awards franchise into the Glow Up Style Awards that will honor the most stylish people, places, and things from the past year through a lens that’s less celebrity-driven and more focused on accessible, everyday style and creativity.
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While past years have been celebrity-heavy and solely the decision of the staff, readers will this year be able to send in their submissions, which could be for a friend, a family member or someone in the public eye. The final list will be composed of Black women aged between 21 and 100 who have made their personal style into a fashion statement that is uniquely their own.
“Over the past two years, we did Glow Up Awards where we recognized 50 people in fashion, beauty, culture who’ve made significant contributions to the category and this year we thought we would try to flip the script a little bit and invite our audience to submit who they think should be included and we left it open. We didn’t say it had to be your sister or BFF. It could be someone like a celebrity who you think really encapsulates the idea of the glow up and should be recognized,” said De Luca.
“So what we’ve seen is that our audience, which is very engaged, they’ve done both. They’ve submitted people who are everyday people and they’ve also selected people like Keke Palmer and Garcelle Beauvais, who they admire and who they think should be included in this roundup,” she added. “I think it’s incredibly important to acknowledge the power and influence that our own audience has. The Root has a very loyal, devoted following and very opinionated.”
The Root’s committee of judges will select the final list of 50, which will be unveiled in May and featured in a special package.
The publication was founded by Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Donald E. Graham in 2008 and was sold to Univision Communications in 2015. Since 2019 it has been part of G/O Media, owned by private equity firm Great Hill Partners. It has been reported that there has been high staff turnover over the past year due to G/O Media’s executives involvement in the site. In a statement De Luca said: “Whenever there is a change at the top of the masthead of any publication, there is always some staff turnover. We recently announced a slate of new hires recently especially in the beauty and fashion area that have all literally hit the ground running.”
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