House of Style 1993: A Model Conversation: Wisdom

hi everybody I'm Cindy Crawford at House of Style we get lots of mail Asking All About modeling and what models are like and what they do so today we've got five top models here to answer all your questions [Applause] [Music] Christy Turlington began our modeling career with Ford at age 16. now at 24 and with over 100 covers tour credit she's considered modeling's most classic Beauty at 15 Naomi Campbell left her mom and London to pursue a modeling career seven years later she's Queen of the runway her next stop is the music world as she makes her first record and marries YouTube bass player Adam Clayton Lauren Hutton got into modeling at 22 to finance a trip to Africa she's also been in 27 movies and says her favorite is American Gigolo I can think of one reason why at 49 and a half she's back into modeling and writing her memoirs Linda Evangelista is the model's model and has been amused to many photographers changing her hair color three times in a year is just one of the ways that she has created excitement around herself during her nine years in the business at 20 Beverly Johnson opened many doors as the first black woman on the cover of Vogue she's authored a book on beauty and health and is also pursuing an acting career and then there's me at 17 I started modeling in Chicago three years later I was in New York and on the cover of Oak but one of the real highlights of my career was my big break on MTV they let me talk [Music] so Lauren when did Jude first decide that you wanted to be a model when I found out that they were making 50 an hour and Christy when you because you're you probably remember Lauren growing up when do you remember first being aware of who Lauren Hutton was RC Cola RC Cola is that the one where you found the pool you know what I love Pepsi life lemon she fell in the pool and she was so so skinny she had to kill her body yeah and Naomi when you were young who do you remember seeing and who did you look up to and who inspired you I think I'm on I remember seeing her pictures just because I've never seen Tia Maria and the commercial so she was like passing through real sleek and elegant some Beverly when did you I mean what made you want to get into it or why did you start oh my reasons were the same as Lawrence for the money yeah we're looking for the easy group yeah and you know and someone said you should be a model and I said take me to your leader did you remember who was the one model that you really admired or looked up to and the one that stuck out in my head was John Severn who they say I said I looked like so now we're all gonna figure out how we all got started because I think that a lot of people want to know that and for me it was there's a local photographer in my small town and he did some pictures of me and just through a process I met an agent in Chicago started off doing underwear ads for Marshall Fields in Chicago that ended up plastered all over my high school and then after I graduated from high school I I you know eventually ended up in New York I used to compete horseback riding and somebody was taking pictures at the stable where I kept my horses and took some photos of my sister and I and sent them to an agency that contacted us afterwards when he took the original photos it wasn't for any professional users just to take a portrait really from there on I started working after school and things like that what about you little Naomi I was playing hooky because I didn't want to go home from school right away and I was hanging out with my school friends in Covent Garden in London and the lady called Beth came up to me and I said oh these girls have long blonde hair and blue eyes and she said do you want to be a model I was I guess I know and you went in not right away my mother wouldn't let me sad like my exams and stuff like a year later I went I was 14 my wedding when I was 15. and she took she used to take her own tests of the model that she would find and she took pictures of me my first pictures on my uniform and your school uniform yeah and sent me to Elle this woman told me if I ever gave up this crazy idea of becoming a lawyer to call this woman in New York she got me an appointment with Glenn hammer and Vogue magazine I went up to glamor Vogue magazine with my mom my knee socks my white gloves top knot wow you were done and by the end of the day they came out and they said we like you we want to take her on a 10-day trip and I said see Mom this is what I walked like a dog you guys before I got my first job those were the first Enchanted 10 times a day that was the first that was my first um shot but after that I said the next thing you do is you go to all the modeling agencies so I went to all the modeling agencies Eileen Ford and Willamina and all the big agencies there's agency called Black Beauty in that time all right and they went right I don't think so and at the time I was too young and stupid to say well I just got finished shooting for glamor right I've never heard of sections so they all turned me down and then you know like 10 days later you know when the word leaked out and uh Eileen and called me and then I'm sorry but how did you get down if you haven't heard that yet I was in uh Miss Teen Niagara pageant but there was a scout in the audience for elite who brought me his card afterwards and can you can you do some school thing I took a course my mom paid for and I did Bridal fashion shows where I'd get twenty dollars for the show including the rehearsals I never got to be the bride I was always the bridesmaid and I did some local department store um advertising for the newspapers I got eight dollars an hour my mother had to take the day off to drive me there and it's been Gathering parking the first model I've ever ever met that went to a modeling school I went to Judy James [Music] obviously you don't have to have gone to school to be a big model since since most of us here didn't but do you think do you think it's something that's valuable or do you think that it's really just a waste of money a self-improvement program and I actually learned my etiquette I know how you know set a table properly how to walk in the door how to go in and get in and out of a door how to walk in the door how to do the stairs how to get eating up it is today yeah I just made nine ghosties a day but for myself five agencies four agencies turned me down there were only five agencies in all all of New York then this was 60 five basically how many agencies are there here now 200. I don't know for those of you who don't know is is just that you go and see the people either photographer or the agency and um and they check you out and they look at you and they go they go like this and they say oh thank you very much hand you back here Brooklyn and you walk out exactly it could be so humiliating it can be humiliating but starting out is mostly pounding the pavement you have to remind people you're out there otherwise you'll never get hired oh [Music] hi I'm Dana Douglas and I'm 16 and I'm a model she's got the grown-up blue dresses today we have a really great day running around like crazy you just don't like show up one day and everyone says you're beautiful darling and then you have a million dollars you know I mean you have to be willing to sort of give up your personal life and allow yourself to be propelled by this industry Henry in here where is Henry they're shooting right there but Henry's got to be around here someplace Henry is the stylist for Bergdorf she books on the model for the catalog the catalogs are really great they're really pretty pie ah it was looking good Dana yeah it's getting better mom doesn't like anything like this my dad says stuff like you know I just don't want it to come back to honcho when you're older but my mom's like are you crazy you look great thank you honey good to see you again nice to see you thanks for coming by sure I don't expect too much don't give up just keep working and hopefully if you're confident in yourself somebody will pick up on you I got signed this with me through my agency in Philadelphia my first real job that I had when I came to New York was working for 17. they built me up a little bit so again they gave me confidence I'm 17 I'm waiting to see Donna Reuben's team and she books other models and she always takes Polaroids to me and I never look good in Polaroids are you planning on staying in New York now for a while yeah I'm here for a while now yeah thank God both looks great thank you it's getting there [Music] bye I don't think it's very important that you have a good uh manners that you're friendly and that you don't that you don't freak out if things don't go the way you want them to go so we're going to Clifford and Wheels Cadillac house and I've never seen them before so it could be good for me to get in with them because catalog is great and you make a lot of money when you do catalog so I'll be paying my bill [Music] thank you thank you very much it was nice to meet you finally be yourself some somehow somewhere it might fit into the whole Fashion Group or you may change it time for me to go home gathered my impression of everybody I've met now I have to wait and see what their Impressions were of me I hope they were good bye do you remember when you first started modeling ever being really treated like an object in the sense that they forgot actually that there's like a person inside of the show have it move across the road 16 and I did a campaign for Japanese client and the stylist thought he could come up and touch my can you save breath they were doing a picture of me in a steam bath and I said I was hot and I wanted to come out and they wouldn't let me out and I passed out finally what in a steviath [Music] grading pictures I think it's just all imagery for me it brought on a lot of insecurements [Music] so Naomi of all the different types of modeling that you do because I know you do a lot of Runway print and commercials also what what's your favorite thing to do I think I like doing I guess they do things it's I like doing stuff like performances like shows are fun because they're live and they're spontaneous and anything can happen [Music] and print I like doing print when I'm a character and I don't look anything like myself what about you Lauren I don't remember [Applause] it's a big a big show and and I know do you like to make sure that because you do a lot and you're very good I like doing everything and I'm so glad that there's different things to do because just doing one else crack up I always preferred to do print because that's what I was best what about you I I I've always said photography because I'm a photography fan and I feel like it's much more intimate and much I don't know it's quieter it's much higher I don't know it's nicer but now that I've been doing a bit more Runway I'm getting used to it and I do like I do like when it comes Linda when did you know that you had made it in the business I mean what was that one picture or that one campaign or that one contract that you got that said I made it I'm here I don't think it was one you know specific picture I think that after about you know my fourth or fifth Vogue shooting it started you were more like I was in oh because for me it was like I remember my first vote cover it was like I remember it August 86 it was pink that was it it was like that's the seal of approval for me August I was my first August also that's the only ones they give me I know I've been so sorry but yeah I didn't say that my vote covers came much later what people say about her she really is a very nice covers came much later like now what about you I'm waiting did you have like one one thing that was like a moment for you that you felt like that was it um probably when I signed a contract with Calvin Klein in 1989 I think that probably because I think that when I started to get involved in the business I always thought that they make it seem that contracts are the thing that you want that everybody wants it's not necessarily so it's a lot of pressure but you think that that's the case so I actually ended up making a mistake and I took one before I should have but well I thought it was but it was and everyone was envious I mean I'm not yeah everyone was like well that's a that's a good setup it didn't turn out to be something that you were happy with but still it was a compliment it was something that I wasn't expecting for a good five or ten years and I got it you know two or three years what happens is to explain it sometimes girls take contracts very early and it makes them very exclusive with one company therefore you Fade Out of the other parts of the business and you end up only doing one client when I said Revlon wouldn't it be great if your skin could always look like it's been on vacation it can because it was the first contract there ever was colors but that's an over color it was an exclusive contract and I could never and it was never with anybody again yeah and it was just like it was terrible it's always alone and it really wasn't any fun that's the only thing that I did like about show was seeing everybody people like uh you guys supermodels don't exist in real life whatsoever we've evolved through having the very best of all the uh you know thing male Beauty Builders worked on us for thousands of hours so we've evolved our own taste out of it so in fact you're created I think we all feel the pressures of not living up to that expectation yeah when people you know meet you on a plane or on the street and they say you look like Linda evangelist and then you say I am find it I think models are lucky because it's one of the few careers where you don't have to stifle your femininity and sexuality you get to use it and I think a lot of women who are career women have to put that part of themselves aside and just you know try to be a man and we don't have to Naomi how much do you use your sexuality I use as much as God's given me as much as I have as much as I can I mean I I like to think that I'm very feminine and um and I try to I don't think I'm particularly sexy at all of anyway I think I'm kind of Gorky but I like to use what I think that I have I think it's just all imagery and working with a good team and a good photographer director can all be faked what do you think because there's so much controversy especially if I'm feminine about what constitutes a sexy photograph because I think all of us like to feel sexy I mean I certainly do that makes me have more self-confidence if I feel sexy but also you know I cut a lot of black for instance about doing Playboy or doing a swimsuit calendar which is basically a TNA calendar and I knew what I was doing I mean that's what it was and and so what do you think is a degrading picture do you think there is such a thing as a degrading picture and what do you think is a sexy picture Lauren usually my degrading pictures were just when I was would look particularly uglier it's a little confusing for me sometimes because you know I thought the whole idea of feminism was to be able to say make your own choices and so for me the degrading pictures that I've done were the ones that I got like you said manipulated into doing when I was 16 and it was for Elle and I said just take your top off it's not a big deal and all of a sudden it comes out in your school and your parents say and it's a big deal when you're young and starting out you're afraid to say no we do have a choice we do have a choice anyway we'll be right back to talk about more sexy photos so don't go away y'all ready for this Naomi we were discussing sexy photos and also um just doing a job that may seem sexist that women May criticize you for doing and I was going to ask you would you do a job with this but I know you have you like myself have done Sports Illustrated why did you do that I did it because I think um well Elite wanted me to do it very much and it was the first time for me doing it but I have to honestly say that I didn't feel comfortable doing it and out of all the photographs I've ever done if that those were not the pictures that I would consider myself looking sexy and I think being sexy comes in with it and that to me was just totally I hate to say it Sports Illustrated in Cosmo are two that really are kind of criticized by some women's groups and you've done Cosmo cover and why why would you do that if you know some people consider it to be sexist I I don't I think it's funny that people criticize everything it's ridiculous I don't do it with anything else I don't understand why people do it the cosmos like the one thing that we do still that we can do in right now that's still like really glamorous and really sexy and we do it for fun do you think when you do sexy photos that um having the relationship with the photographer for me it makes a big difference I think the rapport with the photographer is very important and particularly when you know a photographer is going to do beautiful pictures of you you can really get turned on because you know you're going to look great and um and you know that you know what what you're doing that he appreciates and that he loves what you're doing I think that I think the whole chemistry of that entire sitting from the makeup artist to the hair stylist you can plot and plan all you want but there's a lot of other people who have a lot of control over where your career goes what we do is basically find girls and we try to develop their careers to put them into the market that we already have introduce them to clients we already have and make them have a career at modeling that really is what I like to do is develop girls and really um position them well in their career you're there to deal with every single part of their life whether it's a personal problem whether it's boyfriend mother um weight skin um missing a flight you know it's not that hard if you feel that a model is really ready for a Vogue to send out a book or to visit or whatever you have to give it a little special call or a special opponent that's all I do see about 10 to 15 models a day and if it's a great model I'll introduce her to the editors in the magazine and the editor-in-chief and fashion director I think once you put a model in the magazine whether it's Madness now Vogue or L that exposure alone will create miracles for her you start getting phone calls from all over not only the country but the world they get the exposure through the magazines and the advertising campaigns follow I don't overestimate what Bo can do I mean we can take a girl and we can groom her and we can give her the best hair the best makeup on the next clothes but the camera has to love her a magazine can launch the career of a of a model but I think very often it's closer to a photographer than to a magazine that launches the career of a model the relationship between a model photographer is um well I mean it's everything the thing is this if you're taking great pictures of a girl and she's looking more beautiful than ever she's going somewhere you know and especially if as a photographer you have a forum whether it's one magazine or five magazines and you're developing this girl and she's being seen extensively through your point of view you're creating an image of her did you talk to Stephen I mean he can create a girl he can create the hair he can create the makeup I mean he's certainly invented Linda at the beginning and and Christy and now Naomi and he was the one that you know started all the new goals last year saying it was time to change we have to find the new faces I'm better at the brain and better the character but I prefer for editors to say listen you know I like this girl when she gets on the job and they confirm it then let them do their hair instead of us creating it ourselves and be wrong you will send a girl one new hot girl on a go see and you'll get five coursing is what about this girl and what about the Arkham I haven't seen her and then you'll get jobs tentative jobs on their tracks which will really come from that one go see so then you know that that girl is going to be hot because somehow people start to talk about her do I really think it's timing and if your look is what's in at that time it'll it'll take off it'll happen so Christy out of all those people agents photographers who really influence your career the most I wouldn't say one particular person there's been so many at different times or phases of my career that people that I work with all the time and then it moves on to another group there's so many different groups but Arthur Elgar is a photographer that first took me to do something big and he took me for American Vogue when I was 16. what about you Naomi was there an agent or someone that you could credit with yeah I think I could a theater that discovered me in London than in New York um the photographer I guess I credit Stephen myself it just transforming to someone else I mean basically when I started everybody was about six feet tall and and I wasn't and I didn't look like them and we were supposed to get things fixed and she just liked me and and asked Richard Avalon to shoot me and then the second time around was Steve Mizell sir found me and took pictures of me again and that started Anew I think Stephen is myself is really interesting because he and he makes it fun and he makes it feel special and yeah he's been very important in your career yeah would you say the most influential or one of you can't really say it um yeah definitely definitely been very very people important in my career yeah I've done beautiful beautiful pictures and really I think it's like your work really changed over the course of the time that you were working it did we kind of grew a bit together but um I was around for a long time and then suddenly it was a combination for me of editors photographers magazines suddenly they had this great idea let's use her has anyone ever fallen out of favor with a photographer or a magazine or felt that they'd fallen out of favor I don't think it's necessary but I hate to be told well you can't be on the cover of such a such magazine because you're on the cover three years ago and we just can't have another black model on the cover right now and I've been taught that many many times and it's been a challenge to me to like work and be some determined to break it but it was very helpful to me not just for myself but my whole race Beverly anymore for me opened many doors and I wouldn't have been able to do what I do now if it wasn't for you both well the reason why I got that bowl cover which was August 1974 another August August being the first African-American on the cover because I remember I was we're in avadon studio and they were shooting Lauren Hutton for a cover trying she came in there she says what are you doing what are you 24 why don't you do it on this beautiful woman yeah I said look at her and Polly they got the idea crazy there's something Lauren and I have in common and you talked about a little bit before is that we have flaws that all of a sudden became a trademark so trademark when you started in the business was there pressure for you to get your teeth changed absolutely when you're young and trying out you're a Womanhood you're you're trying to imitate whoever are the standards at the time but don't eliminate your own special traits because if we had God knows what would have happened and I was told I would be taken if they fixed my teeth cut my nose no you were told which I actually like very imagination for me it's gonna stay there yeah it's been it's been so sweet that a few young girls have come up to me and they have them all on their face or whatever and I'm sure it's the same thing for you with young black girls it's like I legitimized or made it okay I made it even beautiful to have them all on your face I actually think it can be a very important job this job because in fact we can sort of hold up something um but don't you think what we hold up sometimes is very unrealistic um you know we we will give it we were given very good packages a lot of it is fantasy magazines you know when you've got 10 hair pieces on your head and green eyebrows but they don't know that they never say in the magazine that she was sitting here for five hours and she squeezed in this dress and her boobs are taped up and blah blah blah blah changed so much I mean what is it is it just there are lots of times of beautiful people lots of different kinds a person with power decides that that's okay or shortness is okay or baldness okay but look they've never made it into a trend I mean look in the teachings day you know but in the 1300s OR 1400s you go have 12 desserts before you had a bookie don't you think not being perfect is more acceptable today than it used to be I hope so and I hope that it evolves even more so but let's take a look at how Santa's Beauty has changed over time [Music] hello baby [Music] [Applause] [Music] serving us [Music] [Music] I wonder what comes between me and my calvins nothing [Music] God [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] so Linda all the papers and fashion magazines are talking about a new look how what do you think this new look is how would you describe it we call them the life [Music] I can't take it because now they're saying they come to me and they say if you've lost so much weight and I mean I would fluctuate five pounds up or down but I'm always the same weight and I think that I'm thin now because I'm trying to catch up to these little girls um I think they're adorable I hate to go with all these little well they went with the grunge grunges I would be tired now it's that romantic thing they're working in that but um I'm I'm working every day I don't see you you're working every day I mean I don't know they're describing it as the antithesis of what of kind of what we are because young girls they have like stringy hair no makeup kind of this blank expression into the camera and so what do that mean for us we can all kind of do that and then when it passes like in two months or six months basically by next season well I'm sure it will usually things last about a year and if that if that's then we'll be able to do to if they go back into the 20s or the 50s or 40s I think it's important to have range as a model and you shouldn't be able to have just one facet I mean that's why I think that all of us have been around for a long time is because you can do different periods and when they get confused like they always do the powers that be and they they don't know what era to copy or to take from it's important that the girls that they're working with can go into each of those areas also I think it's very important to do other things and and to you know get out of Interest like Naomi's doing an album and you know the exercise tapes and you know when that client stops calling you you'll know that you know you have income coming somewhere else that's what we hope that they just the phones don't cut off all one day but slowly congratulations I think that we all hope to be able to be to the point that you can make your decision before they make the decision you know sort of that you're happy and doing other things or you can sort of start to feel I think when you [Music] you're not tempting anything you haven't even started we're we're going to be suing you around I've already been around much longer than I even rolling as women in fact your faces will change and people are interested in seeing what kind of women you turn into they're interested in seeing what kind of woman I turn into I make much more money now modeling it's an idea is the height [Music] y'all ready for this [Music]

Channel: Busy Bee Fashion

Views: 39,827

Keywords: fashion documentary, 1990s supermodel, supermodel, models, Anna winter, model career, vogue, Cindy Crawford, Christy Turlington, Naomi Campbell, Lauren hutton, beverly johnson, house of style, retro fashion, fashion, 1990s fashion, modelling career

Id: P9EriDMmLeI

Length: 30min 49sec (1849 seconds)

Published: Sat Mar 04 2023