In Fashion Part 17

"We were doing a jewelry shoot in Dallas with a Dallas photographer. I had seen the makeup artist's book and had her references, but I had never worked with the makeup person before. I walked in and she was bleaching the girls' eyebrows. The theme was G.o.ddess, but she had her own idea of G.o.ddess. A bleached eyebrow is a major decision. She fought me the whole day. I went into the bathroom and cried. I hated the pictures, but the buyers and everyone else loved them."

MORE THAN A VISUAL STANDARD.

"Neiman's has a voice-a very distinct, witty voice. The writing here is every bit as strong as the pictures."

DON'T DIS DALLAS "There's an incredibly rich, world-cla.s.s architecture and art scene that cultivates the eye: the DMA in Dallas, the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, the Kimbell Art Museum, and the Amon Carter Museum."

THINGS ROBBIN WISHES SHE'D LEARNED Computer skills with software like Adobe's InDesign and PhotoShop. "It's just normal in this world to know those things. I studied film, not graphic design, so I don't know the graphic designer software that's so good for grabbing images and making presentations. This is something I don't have."

Model

WHAT: Model.

DEGREE: None.

TRAITS: Emotional maturity, inner calm, watchfulness, patience; is a good traveler.

ESSENTIAL ABILITIES: Gaze wide-eyed into the camera and communicate a wide range of emotions; walk the runway.

WORKs.p.a.cE: Last address your booker texted you.

PATH TO POWER: Get seen by a good agency; get shot by a renowned photographer.

MOST COVETED GIGS: Solo Vogue cover; Calvin Klein; Chanel ad campaign; first, last, or wedding gown runway turn at Haute Couture show.

DOGGIE JOBS: While they pay well, don't put cheesy lingerie ads or Sears catalog pix in your book.

DRAWBACKS: Unless you are among the world's top fifty models, you are made to feel like an easily replaceable commodity.

MODERN SUCCESS STORIES: Kate Moss, Christy Turlington, Cindy Crawford.

MISCONCEPTIONS: That you can model part time to put yourself through college. (If you have the option, go to college instead.) There's nothing part time about modeling. And if you start at age eighteen or twenty, it's too late.

KEY ALLIANCES: Agencies, bookers, and photographers and their hair and makeup teams.

LIFESTYLE CHALLENGES: Given setting and emphasis on skinny, it's hard to eat healthy; hard not to give in to cigarettes or other worse habits; hard not to grow up too fast; hard to maintain normal relations.h.i.+ps with abnormal travel and hours.

CHANCES OF MAKING IT: 1 in 1 million.

LANGUAGES: You'll need basic English to survive in NYC; beginner French for Paris; Italian for Milan.

STARTING COMP: You'll probably have to pay to have your first pictures made.

POTENTIAL COMP: $$$$$.

Modeling

In a perfect world, this is how you'd become the next great supermodel: You're sixteen, flying back from spring break in South Beach (your best friend Caitlin organized everything). This totally legit guy approaches you at the Miami airport, gives you his card, and says you should call and set up an appointment to visit him in the city when you get back to Connecticut. The weird thing is that Caitlin is considered the pretty one, the popular one, prom queen, cheerleader material. You're the hot girl's best friend-NOT in the same league. You are tall and gawky. Superpale, even after four days in Florida. Boys tease you that you should be on the Romanian basketball team. (They all know you were adopted as a baby from some s.k.a.n.ky orphanage in there.) Stunned, Caitlin pretends to be happy for you.

You peek at his card. "FORD MODELS"!

You are so calling him next Monday.

Skipping school, you take the train into the city on your own. If there's a real possibility of this thing happening, you know it would be better not to have a quietly jealous friend, nagging mom, or clunky boyfriend in tow.

You arrive at the address on Fifth Avenue and Eighteenth Street a little early, so you dip into Starbucks for a coffee. Inside your tote, you have a few simple, clean headshots taken by a friend who's into photography. You've automatically intuited that it would be uncool to bring in overproduced, highly retouched, heavily made up, tacky pictures of yourself. Or goofy yearbook pictures taken outside on a log.

You are signed by the Ford agency on the spot. (Well, technically you'll need to get your parents to sign as well.) The next day, you are supposed to go to a photographer's studio in Tribeca to have more test shots done. Within days, your agent prepares your portfolio and sends you a series of "go-sees."

To save time and money, you buy a $20 MetroCard, grab a subway map, and learn how to zip around the city, visiting six to ten ad agencies, magazines, and commercial clients each day.

WOW! You hear back from your booker that you've been booked for your first shoot with Steven Meisel (the Vogue and Italian Vogue photographer) for something for the Italian edition. Things go fast forward from here. You find someone to share an apartment with in the city. Get your pa.s.sport, and it's LA one day and Laos the next.

After appearing in Italian Vogue and spending three years in the exclusive Vogue model rotation, you get your first U.S. Vogue cover! You've made it! You are a SUPERMODEL!

You spend the next five years pulling in as much as $50,000 a day for commercial clients. You do advertising campaigns for the likes of Chanel, Calvin Klein, Victoria's Secret, and David Yurman.

You hook up with a just-as-rich rock star, have a baby, keep working, and live happily ever after.

Oh, and Caitlin? She hasn't spoken to you since Miami.

In Our Real, Imperfect World ...

There are lots of disreputable people and agencies out there willing to tell you that you're going to make it big, when, in fact, you will end up paying them for photography sessions, a portfolio, and so on. "Right now, there's an oversaturation of agencies, and almost any girl can get signed," explains my friend Kirsten Kenney, head of the model division of the Bryan Bantry Agency. Kirsten previously booked models for major magazines like Harper's Bazaar and Allure. "Whether that girl will make any money is another matter."

But how do you figure that out without getting sucked in by the wrong people promising superstardom? Go to top agencies. If they all say no? It's no.

Do You Have "It"?

"You either have it or you don't," says Kirsten.

"It" means being photogenic: Even if it is not obvious to you or those around you, the face you were born with has to photograph beautifully; you must be able to express yourself through the lens of a camera; and, thanks to your genes, the planes of your face are perfect and the surface of your skin is flawless. And something magic comes through in the image of you.

What Are Your Chances?

Before meeting potential models, most agencies determine whom they will meet based on the headshots the candidates have e-mailed to them. Ford, however, does an "open call" in New York City every Wednesday from 3 to 4 p.m. (see www.fordmodels.com).

Highly selective in her prescreening, Kirsten signs one out of one hundred young women she meets (that's only 1 percent, pals!). But here's the amazing part: A top agent like Kirsten can expect that about 60 percent of the women she does sign will be successful and make money for themselves and for the agency. (Kirsten defines a successful model's salary at $250,000 a year or higher.)

Model Myths

You'll be "discovered" at the mall. Unlikely. While Kate Moss was discovered by an agent at an airport, it doesn't happen often. Girls who live in big cities should visit the big agencies there. Girls who live in the middle of nowhere can either travel to the big-city agencies or try to "bubble up" into the system through modeling contests.

TV REALITY VERSUS MODEL REALITY.

Besides being fun to watch and addictive, shows like Tyra Banks' America's Next Top Model (ANTM) and Tyson Beckford's Make Me a Supermodel (MMAS) offer a live glimpse inside the brutally tough world of modeling.

Sadly, these shows do not produce supermodels. To date, not one actual supermodel or even bordering-on-supermodel has walked off the sets of these shows onto the pages of Vogue or the runways of Paris. The lucky ones are able to transform their TV-land training, acclaim, and attention into the lucrative career of a working commercial model.

Why? Because still photography (not reality television) is still the best testing ground for models; because many of the model contestants are often too old to be starting their careers (over eighteen); and also because the shows do not take into account the subtle s.h.i.+fts in tastes of those few, powerful fas.h.i.+onistas who actually decide these things, people like photographers Steven Meisel, Italian Vogue editor in chief Franca Sozzani and Chanel designer Karl Lagerfeld. Now if this group were the judges ...

You need to be at least five feet, ten inches tall to model. Negatory. To walk runway, you do need to be five feet ten or five feet eleven inches, but for studio photography, you just need to have long legs and be long-waisted. It's a question of proportions. Kate Moss stands only five feet eight inches tall, but she has exquisite proportions.

You can "earn your way through college by modeling." Not. If you start with an agency in earnest and your go-sees start turning to bookings, you'll need to be available full time. To model seriously, you'll need to give up everything else for one to three years.

MODEL SCOOP: TOP AGENCIES AND WHAT THEY'RE LOOKING FOR Of the four top modeling agencies-Ford, DNA, IMG, Women-Ford has historically been the most parent-palatable and "apple-pie-American seeming." And even though the founding Ford family is no longer involved, image-wise, it still has its imprint.

Wherever you end up, Ford's website-www.fordmodels.com-is a better model primer than any book I've ever seen.

Click on the "become a model" tab at the bottom of the home page. Here you'll have three choices: "apply now," "Supermodel of the World Contest," or "open call information."

The power of Ford is that it has locations in Toronto, Miami, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Milwaukee (as in Wisconsin?!), Chicago, and New York as well as a subsidiary office in Arizona. Your best path in is to get yourself to an open call at the most convenient of these locations. Its instructions-"Please bring clean, clear snapshots (no makeup)"-are clear. But, even better, if you click on the Supermodel of the World contest and scroll down, where there's the opportunity to apply online, it's here that they show great examples of the four different digital photos they are looking for: Straight-on, full-length portrait in tight-fitting clothes Straight-on, waist-up portrait (just wear the same clothes, OK?) Straight-on, shoulder-up portrait Profile, waist-up or shoulder-up, portrait Notice in the examples how natural the girl looks in these pictures. Her hair is clean and pulled away from her face. No perms. No blowouts. Her face is devoid of foundation, blush, lipstick, eyeliner. This is the definition of "clean." She's wearing a cool T-s.h.i.+rt and jeans. Nothing forced or fas.h.i.+on-y.

Study these pictures. Work with someone you trust (he or she doesn't have to be a photographer) and get the photos you need. If there's no way you can get to any of Ford's urban offices, send in exactly what they're asking for.

You shouldn't even THINK about being a model if you: Hate sitting around Can't leave the house without tons of makeup Hate cities Hate traveling Hate people playing with your hair or doing your makeup Are not comfortable with people who don't speak English Are religious to the extent that it would affect the clothes you are comfortable wearing and the days you would be able to work Intend to fit modeling in with your high school or college cla.s.s schedule

What to Wear on a Model Go-See

Flats, sneakers, or low boots. "Heels are my number one pet peeve," says Kirsten Kenney of Bryan Bantry. "Don't do that. You may need to bring heels to a runway casting to show them how you walk, but not at an agency or magazine appointment."

Dress as simply as possible. Wear your best-fitting jeans and a white tank top. Your hair should be straight, clean, and pulled back. Not blown out. And don't do a perm or color your hair the night before.

"My biggest nemesis is the aunt who tells her niece that she should be a model, and then this girl with mall hair and too-pink lips shows up," says Kirsten.

Wear moisturizer (it can be tinted if it's superlight and if it matches your skin tone perfectly), nude lip gloss, and the slightest single swipe of brown or brown-black mascara.

What to Say When You Visit an Agency

Nothing! The less you talk the better.

Don't gush. "This has always been my dream."

Don't elaborate. "I love horses and tennis."