"Victoria, the Yale girl, is adorable, also has a great fashion face but her body is not modelesque. Mila, who got kicked off tonight, also had a very oddly pear shaped body which in the real world would be viewed as completely healthy and normal, but for high fashion (okay...I know I am gonna get crucified here) she is (aaaaaaah, am I really gonna say this? ) fat. Big legs, hips and thighs.....not good for modeling especially since they weren't pointing her out as the plus sized girl. They actually never mentioned her weight on the show, perhaps because now it is taboo? Oh, and by fat, I mean "fat for modeling". Sorry, but that is what it is too. I've lived and breathed this industry and been called everything from ethereal to fat assed all in the same day. Seriously."

The truth is, you're absolutely right. I go through runway fashion pics at a rate of about 25 a week. The average collection has 35-50 pieces, and only a handful are worth discussing, but I still have to go through the whole collection. So this whittles it down to about two to three designers a week, spread over the 6 month fashion season. In other words, I look at a lot of these damn photos. And yes, the girls are thin and exotic. They have to be. I saw one just this week from Gwen Stefani's L.A.M.B. line. The girl looked like she had some MASSIVE thighs. If I keep this in context of the runway, she did! That girl was too thick to be on the runway. If I compare her to my own body, it sounds like a stupid statement to make. I mean, that girl's thighs are AT LEAST half the size of mine. Where in the hell do I get off calling her fat?! But view both together. If this outfit made this child, and I do mean child, look like she had large thighs, how freakin' ugly is that outfit going to look on me?! I'm totally doomed!! I wouldn't even consider buying it because I know that it's going to look bad on me. In that case, fashion has failed. It's telling me that I cannot be beautiful. :S So, no. I'm not going to crucify you for that. I get it.

BUT, "my hips measured 34.5". Alright. Now THAT'S crucifixion worthy!! ;) :D In my next life, I'm certain that I'll have a perfect body, but I won't be the least bit interested in fashion. lol

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i actually knew you would totally get where i was coming from since you are into fashion, etc. i think that the general population gets up in arms when it comes to stuff like this.....and lately there seem to be some newbies on here that are a little defensive about just about everything everyone posts....so i was prepping myself for an attack and comments about how people like me propagate bulimia and anorexia epidemics.

i've been at both ends of the industry. and it is a mind fuck and not for the weak. and its not like i've handled rejection and nasty comments like a trooper. i've had plenty of meltdowns and self confidence issues because of it. luckily i am too lazy to have gone crazy at the gym working out hours on end and too muchof a glutton to have taken up starvation. i am on the shorter end of the modeling spectrum at 5'7" (which i should never admit to seeing as i am always marketed as 5'8") and have never been a waif. thin, yes, but not bony. hmmm....guess that i've never had issues getting work although i also never made it to the top (hence, middle model...ha!) but getting to the top also many times requires extracurricular activites with photogs and/or clients....and i am not into that load of crap. in the beginning of my career i also had issues with the owner of my mother agency not thinking i could travel because i was, in his opinion, too short. then i proved him wrong. but it is easier for shorter girls who photograph tall to work then it is for a thicker girl to work regular fashion (instead of plus).

i'll have to check out the girl in the LAMB collection you are talking about but i know i will agree with you! i am sure she is tiny by normal standards but the average runway model is 5"10" and weighs 110 lbs.....so compared to girls like that anyone would be hard put to look portly! ha!

and to be honest, even though i know my perception of the perfect body has been tainted by industry standards, i still dont find the really waify girls attractive. breastbones and sunken cheeks are just not my vision of beauty. my husband thinks those girls look like praying mantises (ha! my favorite bug! eeech!) the girls that i think are drop dead are the victoria's secret type girls. they are still thin but with some tone and shape. watching that fashion show is a totaly practice in masochism. i cant help but start comparing and well, there aint no way in hell this ol mom of two will ever have an ass that sits up on her shoulders and the boobs to match! LOL!

and yeah....the hip thing was a total mind f***. i left tokyo with a complex that is for sure.

Airing my dirty laundry at: Peacocks on Leashes

is wearing a black jacket that looks like a flight attendant uniform, and a pair of capri workout pants. It's not a good look.

I think everyone just assumes that models are ALL anorexic and bulimic. And frankly, that's pretty stupid. Obviously, it's a really cutthroat business, and the ones who are going to really succeed are going to have the figure naturally. I liken it to a football player. If you're going to be a linebacker, sure, *maybe* you could succeed if you started out a 98lb weakling, but more likely, you need to be a pretty big boy to start with.

As far as causing eating disorders, it's so difficult to say. Everyone reads my fashion blog and sees that I'm trying to lose weight, and I think they assume that I must be doing it in an unhealthy way. And the complete opposite is true. I will never be a size 0. I doubt I'll even be a size 6. It's not appropriate for my body type and shape. But when I get to a size 10, I'm going to be rocking it even better than Marilyn Monroe did. lol

Yeah. Those Victoria's secret girl's are gorgeous. I hate them all. :D I totally avoid that show because it's torture. I wouldn't mind actually going to the show though. I'd sit in the front row and flick quarters off their butts. lol

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it's hard for me to get into it- I like fashion, but dont know much about modeling. I do agree with the look they want and go for. I don't like it. You seem like a very small frame of a girl, cant believe they said you had a big butt. It seems to me that it is a very hard business. Was your experience a good one?

i mean, i knew that i had a butt compared to the pancakes most of the girls had in japan and tokyo is notorious for wanting rail thin models. but to be told that 34.5 was fat and that i needed to loose 2 inches in a week was beyond comprehension for me....not to mention totally unrealistic. so i went home. overall its been an awesome experience for me with a few glitches here and there but i started older than most and knew what i wanted to get out of it which was a lot of traveling. so i got what i wanted! enough to start my peacocks blog! LOL! anyways, you arent missing out on anything by skipping out on ANTM. it is crap and nothing at all having to do with the real modeling world...or even real fashion, shoots, etc.

Airing my dirty laundry at: Peacocks on Leashes

Aha! So that is what you do in your spare time!

janice truly is scary. if she gets one more face lift her nose will end up on top of her head! she really has some nerve cutting down the girls in past seasons (she's been replaced by twiggy as a judge) but she is pretty right on in her opinions on a lot of the girls as brutal as it may be. the industry is cut throat beyond words. and if a model makes it through without fitting 99% of the industry standards it is usually because she is well connected. the thing is that clients will normally not talk like that in front of you but what is heard as soon as a girl leaves the room is brutal....i've caught several conversations like that about other girls while waiting for my turn.

you know, the clients least likely to say anything will be the worst in judging a girl. the clients that have thought i needed to lose weight have not been many, but the few that have had that opinion were definitely on the overweight spectrum of things. the make-up artists that have scoffed at my having A pimple have had zits or acne scars, and the casting director in milan who said i had ugly hair looked like her deranged poodle had nested on top of her own dome.

the last bad experience i had like this was in portland a few months ago. i was doing a benefit fashion show as a favor for my agent and one of the designers developed major attitude with me on the day of the fitting telling me i was too skinny! WTF?!?! i had had my baby just 3 months prior so believe me, i have been skinnier. then she took my comp card and told me i looked tired in person. i bit my tongue but wanted to scream "ok bitch, NO ONE looks as good as they do in their comps in person. it is smoke & mirrors, modeling is in and of itself an illusion, fantasy, magic. and i am doing this freakin show for FREE so quit your crap!" and yes i may have looked a bit tired, my daughter was still a newborn. on the night of the show as we are rushing backstage from rolling rack to rolling rack for the next outfit to use on the runway i couldnt find mine on her rack. she strolls up to me with a smirk and tells me that she didnt want me in her dress.. and she was wearing the dress herself! and believe me, she is a far from attractive woman by any standards. (insiders like to call people like her model haters).

so yeah, it hurts, it sucks but it can also be glorious. the good clients make up for the bad, the money and travel opps are bar none, getting to live the lifestyle is definitely worth taking some abuse for (ha!)....like i said, i started older so i think i've handled things better than maybe a girl who starts at 14 would. but no matter what it is a mind trip to hear that you are too short, too skinny, too fat, too white, too tan, too ethnic, not ethnic enough, too freckled, not freckled enough, and the list goes on.....on a daily basis. thank god i never had anyone like janice scream this kind of stuff in may face though!

ok, i am tired, long day, so am probably rambling at this point. suffice it to say that tyra's show is the jerry springer show of modeling reality TV. all fluff and shock value.

and let me take this opp to shamelessly advertise my modeling blog.....Peacocks on Leashes....the link is below this sentence somewhere.....if you go back to my first entries and read through to my last post it gives a real account of life as a fashion model. i'm only a quarter of the way through it....have been slacking on writing there lately.....but all of this model talk is getting me inspired to get caught up! :-D

Airing my dirty laundry at: Peacocks on Leashes

That must have been crushing. Good for you, ModelMom, for hanging in there so that you could experience the good as well as the bad!

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