No Clothes, No Problem: Celebs Cash In On The Naked Campaign Boom

Hailey Bieber has become the latest celebrity to appear in a deliberately provocative advertising campaign, posing for Alaïa wearing only a pair of £740 mesh shoes.

The model, who married Justin Bieber in 2019, was photographed in a series of carefully staged images for the French fashion house. The campaign follows a wider trend in which red carpets, fashion shoots and celebrity advertising have increasingly embraced the idea that less clothing can mean more attention.

The “naked dress” has become a regular feature of celebrity events, while revealing social media posts and provocative brand campaigns now often function as part of a public image strategy. For many stars, nudity or near-nudity is no longer only a fashion choice. It is a way to sell products, shape a personal brand and dominate the online conversation.

Dakota Johnson used that approach earlier this year in a Calvin Klein campaign. The Fifty Shades actress appeared in black underwear and told ELLE that the collaboration matched where she is in her life.

She said she feels calm, centred and comfortable in her body, adding that sensuality depends less on the clothes themselves than on how they make a person feel.

Jennifer Lopez took a similar route in 2022 while promoting a body-care product from JLo Body. The singer posed without clothes for the campaign and used the launch to promote a message about confidence and ageing. “Beauty has no expiration date,” she said.

Sydney Sweeney turned the formula into comedy for Dr. Squatch Natural Body Wash. The Euphoria star appeared in a bubble bath and addressed the camera with a deliberately suggestive line before revealing that she was promoting body wash. The ad used her image as a sex symbol but framed it as a joke about marketing to men.

Kim Kardashian has long made exposure part of her business model. In 2021, she posed in nude tights to promote SKIMS, the shapewear brand she launched in 2019.

The company later became one of the biggest successes in celebrity fashion, with The Guardian reporting in 2025 that it had reached a valuation of $5bn.

Jennifer Aniston’s 2011 Smartwater campaign offered a softer version of the same idea. The Friends star posed topless to promote the brand and later linked her youthful appearance to water, daily movement and switching off from outside noise.

Other campaigns have used nudity for humour, nostalgia or activism. Former golfer and influencer Paige Spiranac posed in a bathtub filled with golf balls for LA Golf, recreating a famous image of Jan Stephenson from the 1980s.

Gigi Hadid appeared nearly nude in campaigns for Versace and Stuart Weitzman during her rise as one of fashion’s biggest models.

Gillian Anderson used a similar visual strategy for environmental and animal-rights causes. In 2013, she posed with a conger eel to support a campaign against deep-sea trawling, and later appeared in PETA’s “I’d Rather Go Naked Than Wear Fur” campaign.

Gemma Collins also took part in the same PETA campaign, saying that beauty comes in all shapes and sizes and that people should feel comfortable in their own skin.

Lady Gaga’s 2012 campaign for the fragrance Fame used nudity as surreal performance. The singer posed almost naked, with small figures covering parts of her body, in a campaign that matched the theatrical image that had helped make her famous.

Kate Moss had been doing this long before the current wave of celebrity branding. In 2006, she posed without clothes except for a Nikon camera, and in 2022 she used a similar stripped-back image to launch her wellness brand COSMOSS.

Moss has said that nudity became something she had to get used to as a model, even though she did not always feel comfortable with her body.

Taken together, these campaigns show how celebrity advertising has changed. What once might have been treated as scandal is now often treated as strategy. For fashion, beauty, wellness and lifestyle brands, the exposed body has become a shortcut to attention. For celebrities, it can be a way to sell not only a product, but confidence, control and a carefully managed public image.