Adut Akech Bior ( ; born 25 December 1999) is a South Sudanese-Australian model. Akech made her fashion week runway debut as an exclusive in the Saint Laurent S/S 17 show and went on to close both their F/W 17 and S/S 18 shows as an exclusive. In 2018, she was chosen as "Model of the Year" by models.com, an honour which was repeated the next year. Early life Akech was born in South Sudan (formerly part of Sudan), but was raised in Kakuma, Kenya. She was 7 years old when she moved away from Kenya along with her mother to Adelaide, Australia as South Sudanese refugees. Akech has five siblings. Akech was known as "Mary" in Adelaide, as Australian teachers found it difficult to pronounce her name. Career Akech was introduced to the fashion industry by her family, and despite getting scouted multiple times by local modelling agencies when she was 13 and 14 years old, she started her modelling career at 16 years old, signing to her mother agency, Chadwick Models, in Sydney, Australia. Within the fashion industry, she prefers her birth name, Adut. Akech's runway debut was in a local fashion show, put together by her aunt. She then went on doing Melbourne Fashion Week, where she took digitals for a Saint Laurent casting in Paris Fashion Week. After Melbourne Fashion Week, back home in Adelaide, she got a call from her agent confirming her for the Saint Laurent show, and took a flight to Paris a day after, making her major Fashion Week debut at Saint Laurent's S/S 17 show and signing to Elite Model Management in Paris. Since then, Akech has done 4 campaigns and closed 2 shows for Saint Laurent, 1 campaign and 2 shows for Valentino, one campaign for Zara, and one campaign for Moschino, as well as walked for Alexander McQueen, Givenchy, Kenzo, Prada, Lanvin, Loewe, Miu Miu, Acne Studios, Tom Ford, Tory Burch, Jason Wu, Bottega Veneta, Anna Sui, Calvin Klein, JW Anderson, Simone Rocha, Burberry, Off-White, Ellery, Jil Sander, Giambattista Valli, Proenza Schouler and Versace. She has shot editorials for American Vogue, British Vogue, Vogue Italia, Vogue Paris, I-D Magazine, Le Monde M Magazine, Modern Matter, Numéro, The Gentlewoman, WSJ., T Magazine and Vogue Australia. Akech has landed magazine covers for I-D Magazine, 10 Magazine Australia, Vogue Italia, British Vogue, Vogue Australia, Portrait, Elle Croatia, L'Officiel Singapore and Le Monde