Slaves to fashion: Supermodels pose in Havana

After both models posed for an extensive photo shoot in Havana, the editors took that safe, well-trekked fashion magazine industry path and chose pale Kate for the cover. She's frolicking on a beach in something described as an oxblood stretch chiffon Gucci tank ($120) and a Gucci crystal bikini ($2,425).

Needless to say, Naomi, ebony goddess of the catwalk, was steamed. ``After years in this business,'' she pouted to the New York Post, ``I'd hoped to see more progress in ethnic diversity.''

Indeed, it's backward, ludicrous and offensive that in 1998 the big fashion magazines almost exclusively project white models on their covers. And I'd be devoting this space to slamming supermodel discrimination, if this particular cover didn't conceal an even bigger scandal.

For all her attempts at sounding socially conscious -- or conscious at all -- Naomi missed the real point of outrage. Arguing about which multimillion-dollar body graces this issue is like complaining about lost luggage after a plane crash.

When Naomi, Kate and the Harper's crew packed for the reality-chic backdrops of Havana, they spared no label or touch of designer luxury. Gaultier, Lauren, Prada, they were all represented, displayed in the crumbling streets of the Cuban capital.

The models tooled about in a convertible, gushed about their private 90-minute audience with Fidel Castro, held a press conference at the Hotel Nacional.

The fruits of their labor are splayed across 18 glossy pages, in lush photographs by Patrick Demarchelier. There's Naomi surrounded by elementary schoolchildren in revolution-red Pionero uniforms. She's wearing what any Cuban worker would wear to pick up her son at school, a Marc Jacobs cotton poplin shirt ($250) and plaid wool pleated skirt ($995). And there's Kate, flanked by ballet school students. She models this season's favorite in Havana, a maroon skirt by Jean Paul Gaultier ($805) and a white T-shirt ($95).

``Cuban society portraits in an old Havana building,'' says the caption for one shot of Naomi, posed against a peeling wall in a cream wool fitted Ralph Lauren jacket ($1,295) and matching knee-length skirt ($550). It's that ideal office-to-dinner party look for the Guanabacoa professional.

Unfortunately, the models didn't stay long enough explore what it costs Cubans to buys things like shoes, dresses and suits. I wish they had packed one particular document along with the Gucci iridescent red silk fitted shirt ($525) and the matching iridescent oxblood acetate/silk twill skirt ($525).

Written last year by Cuban economist Vladimiro Roca, this document says the average Cuban worker must labor 213 hours and 19 minutes to buy a pair of Cuban-made men's shoes. The labor time for a Cuban-made women's dress is 116 hours and 21 minutes. A Cuban-made suit: 116 hours and 2 minutes.

Some other examples:

For 8 kilograms of bread -- 14 loaves weighing 20 ounces each -- the average worker must labor 19 hours and 12 minutes.

For 250 grams of butter -- about two sticks -- 13 hours and 52 minutes.

For the same amount of coffee -- a little less than a can -- 69 hours and 19 minutes.

For a kilo of pork -- 2.2 pounds -- 123 hours and 43 minutes.

For a single liter of milk, 27 hours and 43 minutes.

For the standard basket of daily staples, including beans and rice and other basic foods, a Cuban worker must put in 1,375 hours, or nearly three months, of work.

In other words, since the average Cuban makes 205 pesos a month (about $10.25), they'd have to work 10 years to buy that cream wool Lauren jacket.

But alas, Naomi and Kate packed their Fendi bags and left Havana without ever meeting Vladimiro Roca. That would have required enterprise and far too much social consciousness. Roca, a dissident in that island of fashionably distressed looks, is in a political prison.