On April 19th Netflix released White Hot: The Rise and Fall of Abercrombie & Fitch, a documentary tracing the explosive growth of the fashion and pop culture sensation and how its clothing and seductive marketing dominated youth culture in the 1990s and beyond. The documentary also takes a look at ultraprivate CEO Mike Jeffries, bad press, the brand’s reluctance to move with the ever-changing times, and as lawsuits later alleged, discrimination in its hiring practices.
“One of the earliest brands to really merge youth culture and sex appeal was really Calvin Klein,” Robin Givhan, Washington Post senior critic at large, says in the documentary. “What Abercrombie did was they made this middle ground between the sex that Calvin Klein was selling and the all-American preppiness that Ralph Lauren was selling. Just aspirational enough but not so expensive that it was out of reach.”
In Abercrombie’s heyday its marketing was as popular as the preppy clothing, with suggestive, sometimes nude campaigns shot by famed fashion photographer Bruce Weber. When you look back you will see that the retail brand featured a ton of models including Jamie Dornan, Channing Tatum, Kellan Lutz, Emma Roberts, Jennifer Lawrence and even Taylor Swift before they became famous in various states of undress.
Here’s a look back at 20 celebrities who modelled for Abercrombie & Fitch before they were famous.
Taylor Swift, 2003
Jennifer Lawrence, 2006
Emma Roberts, 2005
Channing Tatum, 2001
Penn Badgley, 2005
Ashton Kutcher, 1998
Jamie Dornan, 2002
Kellan Lutz, 2004
January Jones, 2005
Michelle Trachtenberg, 2004
Leelee Sobieski, 1999
Olivia Wilde, 2004
Lindsay Lohan, 1998
Chris Carmack, 2004
Trevor Donovan, 2003
Sienna Miller, 2002
Jesse McCartney, 2005
Heidi Klum, 2002
Nikki Reed, 2004
Alexander Ludwig, 2013
