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I give kudos to people like Zendaya who are like, 'Yes, I want to inspire young kids.' And I'm like, 'Girl, that's a lot of work!'
I feel like I am an inspiration. That's the word I prefer. I don't believe that I have to be a role model, someone to be emulated.
I get comments saying that I'm a leper, I control how my skin changes, I bleach my skin, my skin's burned. None of those are true.
I think we need to take a step back and realize what the real issues are - it's not being from different places or being different.
The worst thing I've done while sad is sit in defeat. That's very unhealthy. The best thing to do is dust yourself off and try again.
I was never raised as the daughter with vitiligo or the granddaughter with vitiligo or the cousin with vitiligo. I was just Chantelle.
Growing up in the greater Toronto area, I was a happy kid. I was my mother's first child, surrounded by admiring godparents and cousins.
I didn't have a problem with myself or my skin. I had a problem with the way people treated me because of my skin. They tried to define me.
My confidence was more of a fake-it-until-you-make-it kind of thing. I tried to build my own confidence and not rely on the opinions of others.
Growing up, I didn't have a lot of real friends, and the people I was friends with, I've grown apart from - they were frenemies more than anything.
I've been doing my own makeup since I was 15. I would steal my mom's products, go online, watch YouTube videos of girls doing their makeup, and try.
Social media is a great way to get discovered in the industry because it's free, it's worldwide, and everyone's on it - a very powerful combination.
I don't really talk about 'ANTM,' although I'm very grateful for it, as it was the platform that allowed me to catapult to where I should have been.
Things were fine in elementary school, but when I moved schools in grade three, not only was I the new kid, I was the new kid with the skin condition.
I think you have to feel your best by yourself. I do think it's important to have a solid friend that you can turn to, though - one that you can vent to.
I learned to love who I am despite what anyone would say about or to me. This gave me the courage to really stand up to anyone or any obstacle in my life.
Nick Knight was my first big gig as a 'real' model. Prior to and during 'ANTM,' I never actually called myself a model because I always viewed it as a hobby.
You can't let someone else lower your self-esteem, because that's what it is - self-esteem. You need to first love yourself before you have anybody else love you.
If God wanted be to be black, I'd be black; if he wanted me to be white, I'd be white, so I guess He chose for me to be both and original. That's the way I'm supposed to be.
If humans want to see the same types of people over and over, that's what industries will give us. If we want to see something different, that's what they'll have to give us.
When I was young, I was picked on for something that today I feel is amazing. One thing about me connects millions of people around the world. And it's my skin condition - vitiligo.
If you're not drinking enough water, or you're not eating enough vegetables, or you're not working out enough, or you're not getting your toxins out, I feel like it always reflects.
There wasn't anyone who was specifically taking me under their wing. I definitely looked up to people, though, one major person being Naomi Campbell, of course. That's, like, a given.
A lot of people ask me how I keep my skin fairly smooth and avoid breakouts, and I think that's because I always take off my make-up before I go to bed, and I mean really take it off.
Regardless of what race, what color, what sex, what nationality, what sexual orientation - regardless of who you are, equality should always rule! Whatever is right for you is right. Period.
When I got older, it got harder because when kids get older, they get meaner, so I went through a lot of bullying and people calling me, like, 'zebra' or 'cow,' so it was really hard growing up.
Like any other kid, I was trying so hard to fit in that school made no sense to me. I wasn't attending class; I was trying to hang out in the caf with the cool kids. I was always trying to be cool.
My parents separated before I was born, but they remained friends, so I was close to both sides of my family, with siblings and cousins and godparents. I've had the same best friend since grade six.
I am happy with my skin, and I'm proud of my skin, which is why I wear it so boldly. But if a job wanted me to, say, try a smoky eye and cover the vitiligo around my eye, I wouldn't have a problem with that.
I don't do much cooking because it's impossible when you travel so much. You go grocery shopping, buy everything, and then get a call to fly out for two weeks. By the time you're back, all the food is rotten.
My skin's not a normal sight. When a photographer says, 'I don't know what it is, but that's just not it...' I know. They like the different colours of my skin. They're not getting them with a particular outfit.
Even as a little girl, my mom never wanted me to watch BET, but when I was at my grandparents' house, and my older cousins were there and I could watch it, I was infatuated with the idea that I could one day be a DJ or the host of a show.
I feel like I pull inspiration from everyone, and I feel like I'm honored and grateful that people feel that they can pull inspiration from me, be inspired by me. But I definitely don't think I'm a role model. I'm not someone to be imitated.
For me personally, I have vitiligo, so my whole career, it's always been this very odd debate: 'Does she want to be white? Is she white and black? Is her mum white?' It's always been this question of my background, my race, and what I stand for.
I love to play with make-up. I adapt my beauty look to my outfit, so as soon as I know what I'm wearing, I know if I want to go for a red lip or a smoky eye. I usually won't put those two together, but it all depends on what outfit I'm going for.
With my skin, I have to avoid direct contact with the sun, so that, combined with my mom being conservative, meant I grew up wearing stockings under shorts and long sleeves under tank tops. It was kind of embedded in me that I was supposed to be covering up.
I faced challenges as a kid, but who hasn't? A lot of people have experienced far worse. I was bullied, sure, and it was painful at the time. I even quit high school to get away from it. But I've never been the kind of person to let my past predict my future.
Chantelle Brown-Young is my real name. Winnie is my nickname that I was given as a teenager, and it has stuck with me. I've combined my real name and my nick name to create 'Chantelle Winnie.' My alter ego, where I seek confidence when I model, is 'Winnie Harlow.'
I'm just living life. And if that inspires you, I'm proud, but I'm not going to put pressure on myself to be the best person in the world and tell everyone I have vitiligo. If you want to know about it, you can do your research. Either way, I'm not in the dictionary under 'vitiligo.'
Funnily enough, of course I've always thought B was amazing, but I've never been, like, 'Beyhive status'... until actually meeting her. I would honestly drop anything I'm doing to work for her again. Not just because of who she is but because of my experience with her filming for two days.
A journalist in Toronto named Shannon Boodram saw my Facebook page and told me I was 'strikingly beautiful.' She shot a YouTube video of me, and it made a hit, grabbing thousands of views. She said the camera loved me and that I should be a model. I had never thought about modeling - it just hadn't seemed possible.
I love myself the way I am, but people will always message me about other people with vitiligo who cover their skin. 'Winnie Harlow, you need to tell them that they need to love themselves the way they are and stop covering their skin!' No! If that's what makes them comfortable and what makes them happy, let them be.
I discovered that I was 'different' in the third grade. As the new kid at school, I was trying hard to find my footing. I thought I had made friends with a couple of girls - until they stopped talking to me. When I confronted them, they said their mothers had warned them to stay away because they might catch my skin condition.