Hillary Clinton, 74, said that she started wearing her infamous pantsuits in the 1990s after a Brazilian company used the image of her in a skirt for a suggestive lingerie advertisement.
‘I was sitting on a couch and the press was let in, there were a bunch of them shooting up,’ Clinton recounted on Sunday to CBS News host Norah O’Donnell when describing the moment the image was captured when she was still first lady.
‘All of a sudden, the White House gets alerted to these billboards that show me sitting down with — I thought my legs [were] together, but the way it’s shot, it’s sort of suggestive,’ the former Secretary of State added.
The ad, launched in 1995 in Brazilian magazines, was for the lingerie brand Duloren and featured an image where Clinton was pictured accidentally showing her panties beneath a tight skirt during a trip to Brazil.
One entire page was the image, while the opposite page included a message from the brand to then-President Bill Clinton: ‘Mr. President of the United States, Your Excellency cannot imagine what a Duloren (brand) can do.
‘A homage from Duloren to one of the most important women of the decade,’ the message continued in smaller letters.
She was 49-years-old at the time the ad was printed.
This was the moment coupled with the constant photographing of her, Clinton noted in her interview with NBC, led her to make the decision to start exclusively wearing pantsuits, which have become a staple of her wardrobe.
Even when Clinton was pictured in a flowy summer dress at the Venice Film Festival last week in Italy, she was wearing a pair of leggings underneath.
She explained that following the Brazilian ad experience, photographers started to try and catch a slip up, saying that when she was walking stairs they would be below her snapping images.
‘I just couldn’t deal with it,’ she said.
Clinton was sitting down with her daughter Chelsea Clinton, 42, to promote their upcoming AppleTV+ docuseries ‘Gutsy’, which starts streaming on Friday, September 9.
After Clinton shared her story with O’Donnell, her daughter revealed: ‘I didn’t know that story, it’s by far and away the greatest revelation I had.’
When the ex-first lady was asked during the interview about choosing to stay in her marriage with her husband after it became international knowledge that he was unfaithful, she said she has ‘no regrets.’
She also said remaining married to Bill was the ‘gutsiest’ decision of her private life – a nod to the name of her docuseries.
Hillary and Chelsea’s series is based on their co-authored work The Book of Gutsy Women: Favorite Stories of Courage and Resilience.
The show follows the mother-daughter duo on adventures to feature some of who they claim are the world’s ‘boldest and bravest’ women, which includes artists, activists and community leaders.
Appearances will include actresses Kate Hudson, Mariska Hargitay and Goldie Hawn along with comedian Amy Schumer and women’s soccer player Megan Rapinoe.
Ojelabi, the publisher of Freelanews, is an award winning and professionally trained mass communicator and a recipient of the D9112 Superstar Icon Award, who writes ruthlessly about pop culture, religion, politics and entertainment.
