Doutzen Kroes: An Angel For Elephants By Ruven Afanador For Bloomberg Pursuits

Supermodel Doutzen Kroes is on a mission for elephants. Ruven Afanador captures Doutzen, styled by Brian Coats in Dolce & Gabbana, Michael Kors, Celine and more for Bloomberg Pursuits. 

Doutzen is interviewed by Caroline Winter about her work to save the elephants. GLAMTRIBALE is also dedicated to elephant conservation, and we recovered in September the Dutch beauty's Knot On My Planet campaign. 

“We tie a knot when we don’t want to forget,” Kroes says, explaining the campaign’s slogan. “We’ve been forgetting the elephants, and if we don’t do something now, they will disappear.”
Doutzen speaks reverentially about these severely endangered elephants, telling me something that I didn't know:

Elephants can weigh as much as 15,500 pounds each, but you won’t necessarily hear them coming—the soft tissue in the animal’s enormous platelike feet acts like a shock absorber. “They’re almost completely silent,” says Dutch model Doutzen Kroes, recalling her first encounter with elephants in the wild.

Instead of footsteps, their approach is more likely signaled by snapping branches or the low, rumbling noises they sometimes use to communicate. When the animals finally appear, Kroes says it’s an emotional experience. “They’ve been around for millions and millions of years, and they’re so big, and then you see these tiny, friendly eyes.”

Related: Doutzen Kroes Leads 'Knot On My Planet, Igniting Fashion Industry For Elephant Conservation