What is Adele's Notting Hill Carnival Photo?

An August 30, 2020 Instagram post where Adele wore a Jamaican-flag bikini top and bantu knots to mark the cancelled Notting Hill Carnival, drawing accusations of cultural appropriation.

Where did Adele's Notting Hill Carnival Photo come from?

Adele posted the picture to her Instagram account on August 30, 2020, with a caption honoring what would have been that year's Notting Hill Carnival in London.

What does Adele's Notting Hill Carnival Photo mean?

It became a prompt for jokes about 2020 exhaustion and for comedic rewrites of Adele's songs as Jamaican dancehall tunes.

How do you use Adele's Notting Hill Carnival Photo?

Posts typically pair the image with rewrites of Adele's lyrics in Jamaican patois, like @Jaboukie's 'nuh bodda' line riffing on 'Someone Like You'.

Is Adele's Notting Hill Carnival Photo still popular?

Interest peaked in late August and early September 2020 when outlets like E! Online covered the backlash, and conversation about it faded afterward.

Adele's Notting Hill Carnival Photo

2020viral photodead

Published October 24, 2026

Adele's Notting Hill Carnival Photo refers to an Instagram post from August 30, 2020, where the British pop singer wore a Jamaican-flag bikini top and bantu knots to mark the pandemic cancellation of London's annual Notting Hill Carnival. The post drew accusations of cultural appropriation and inspired a flood of jokes rewriting her song lyrics in Jamaican patois. Within 24 hours, Twitter users turned 'Rolling in the Deep' and 'Someone Like You' into mock dancehall tunes.

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Overview

Jokes about the photo fell into two main veins online. One group used Adele's picture as the latest piece of evidence that 2020 was exhausting, with Black Twitter users calling her look the year's next celebrity misstep4. A second strand recast Adele's ballads as dancehall and reggae tracks, rewriting her hit choruses in Jamaican patois3.

Defenders of Adele noted she grew up in Tottenham, a London area with a large Jamaican diaspora, and had attended Notting Hill Carnival for years2. Celebrity friends including Lisa Rinna and Chelsea Handler left supportive comments on the Instagram post without weighing in on the appropriation debate2.

Gallery

Origin & Background

Platform

Instagram (source) / Twitter (viral spread)

Creator

Adele

Date

2020

On August 30, 2020, Adele posted a picture of herself in a Jamaican-flag bikini top, yellow feathered wings, and bantu knots to Instagram, captioned 'Happy what would be Notting Hill Carnival my beloved London'1. Reportedly taken at a previous year's carnival, the post gained more than 4.3 million likes in under 24 hours5. Notting Hill Carnival, London's annual street festival celebrating Caribbean and Black British communities, had been cancelled that summer due to the coronavirus pandemic2.

How It Spread

Within hours of Adele's post, criticism and jokes filled Twitter. @FredTJoseph's 'Black people have been through enough in 2020' tweet gained more than 700 retweets and 5,900 likes4. @theferocity's 'this year just won't let up' earned over 410 retweets and 8,500 likes6.

The patois remix jokes took off the same day. @Jaboukie's rewrite of 'Someone Like You' as 'nuh bodda. mi will find sumadi who come in jus like you' collected more than 3,800 retweets and 34,000 likes3. @301mair's 'Rolling Pon De Deep' line gained 1,400 retweets and 7,800 likes7. E! Online and Junkee ran stories on the backlash within 48 hours2 8.

Timeline

2020-08-30

Adele posts the Jamaican-flag bikini and bantu knots photo to her Instagram with a caption honoring Notting Hill Carnival.

2020-08-30

@Jaboukie's patois rewrite of 'Someone Like You' and @FredTJoseph's '2020 exhaustion' tweet go viral on Twitter.

2020-08-31

E! Online publishes coverage of the backlash and the celebrity comments on the post.

2020-09-01

Junkee and Buzzfeed run follow-up stories as the patois remix jokes keep circulating.

How to Use This Meme

Posts typically take an Adele song title or lyric and rewrite it in Jamaican patois, often alongside the carnival photo. Common examples include dialect spellings of 'Someone Like You' or 'Rolling in the Deep,' sometimes attached to '2020 is exhausting' one-liners posted with the original image3.