Céline Dion says she hopes to “encourage a dialogue of equality and possibility” by launching a gender-neutral children’s clothing line.
The five-time Grammy winner unveiled the CELINUNUNU collection late Tuesday with a quirky, James Bond-style ad. In it, she’s shown in the maternity ward of a hospital, blowing a handful of sparkling confetti over a group of infants and, as if by magic, replacing their traditional pink and blue sleepwear with black and white, non-gender-specific ensembles. She’s later chased out of the ward by security guards as she attempts to escape before being hauled off to jail.
“We miss the past. They dream of tomorrow,” Dion says in the below clip. “We may thrust them forward into the future, but the course will always be theirs to choose.”
The CELINUNUNU collection features more than 70 stereotype-free styles for kids aged 0 to 14 years and was created with the children’s boutique brand NUNUNU, which specializes in unisex designs.
“I’ve always loved NUNUNU and what they represent,” Dion wrote on Twitter Tuesday. “Partnering with [founders Iris Adler and Tali Milchberg] to encourage a dialogue of equality and possibility makes so much sense.”
In a Wednesday interview with HLN’s “Morning Express with Robin Meade,” Dion said she’s tried to stay away from gender stereotypes when raising her 8-year-old twins, Eddy and Nelson, and 17-year-old son, René-Charles.
Recalling an early visit to Walt Disney World with her three sons, she said, “I thought they were going to go for the big superheroes. They were looking at princesses. And they all wanted to be Minnie Mouse.”
She continued, “I end up saying to myself, ‘You know what, it’s OK.’ You know why it’s OK? Because they’re talking, they’re finding themselves.”
As for the CELINUNUNU line itself, Dion said, “The message I’m trying to get across is you raise your children the way you want to raise your children. You have to decide what’s right for them. We’re just proposing another way to take away the stereotype.”