Balenciaga Designer Apologizes for Ad Campaign Featuring Kids

Balenciaga’s artistic director has apologized for a promotional campaign that drew criticism that it sexualized children.

Demna, as the designer at the Kering SA fashion brand is known, said he was sorry for the “wrong artistic choice” behind a gifting campaign that included child models holding teddy bears clad in what appeared to be bondage gear.

Demna

Photographer: Geoffroy van der Hasselt/AFP/Getty Images

“It was inappropriate to have kids promote objects that had nothing to do with them,” he wrote on his official Instagram account Friday.

After a social media outcry, Balenciaga has withdrawn the images. Earlier this week, Kim Kardashian said she was ...