Victoria’s Secret Models In Training For Big Day
It’s coming up to the biggest day in lingerie – the Victoria’s Secret Runway Show – and the models are preparing to be examined at all angles.
Their beauty regimes sound – if not unhealthy – just downright punishing.
Adriana Lima, the beauty who wore the multi-million dollar bra last year (this year’s honour goes to Australian Miranda Kerr, who says happily that she’s ‘still breastfeeding’ which keeps the weight off), gave an interview about her preparations and they’re very full-on.
Lima goes on an absolutely no-carb diet with only small amounts of protein allowed, and trains for up to two hours a day.
Then, the week before the event, she goes on a liquid-only diet: no solids, just protein shakes.
And it gets even harsher – 12 hours before the show, she stops drinking entirely. No water, no nothing.
Apparently ‘you can lose up to eight pounds’ in water weight through that dehydration regime.
The regime is so intense that a commentator compared it to ‘training for a marathon’ – although marathon runners have to eat substantial amounts of carbs, so perhaps it’s not the best comparison.
However, when the models come tramping down the runway in skimpy ensembles, let’s spare a thought for the amount of effort and sacrifice they put into looking that svelte – and how parched and cranky they must be afterwards.
The lives of models: always less glamorous than they seem.
Image: Adriana Lima.
The Sartorialist In Hot Water
Scott Schumann, owner of the blog The Sartorialist, has been in the headlines frequently lately.
He did a slightly unwise interview with a magazine in which he boasted about how much his blog earned, and has been criticised for his insistence on featuring women who are size 2 and below.
However, his latest controversy is a lot less straightforward.
Schumann, who’s known for embracing Parisian chic, features a photograph of a young girl with a pacifier on his blog early this week. A storm of comments erupted – calling him a ‘creeper’ and ‘inappropriate’, among others.
The post has since been taken down.
However, other fashion identities are sticking up for Schumann, insisting that even if the girl is underage and probably dressed by her mother, she does represent a very Parisian style for children, and he was given permission to photograph her.
The photo is also not sexual or overly familiar.
Children are the newest focus of the fashion world – with Elle Fanning and Chloe Moretz in Vogue and Chanel launching an online game for children to design and colour their own Chanel clothes (to be found here), they’re increasingly a goldmine for enterprising designers.
Do you think Schumann went too far, or was just doing his job?
Image: The Sartorialist.
Lindsay Lohan’s Playboy Pictorial ‘Will Reference Marilyn Monroe’
Troubled starlet and fashionista Lindsay Lohan, who has just served four hours in jail for violating probation, has shot a pictorial for Playboy.
The theme? Apparently a direct reference to Marilyn Monroe’s own Playboy spread.
Monroe famously featured in the first issue of Playboy in 1953, though without her express consent. The nude shoot had been conducted in 1949, before she was famous.
Lohan has featured in Monroe-inspired pictorials before, which has led some fashion commentators to criticise her for piggy-backing off another famous woman’s image.
She did a shot-for-shot reenactment of the famous Bed Sessions of Bert Stern some years ago.
The originals of that shoot – featuring never-before-seen pictures which were scored through by Marilyn’s editing pen – are on display for one week in Milk, including one, at left, taken just six weeks before she died.
Lohan has a complicated relationship with the fashion world. She has featured in Vanity Fair frequently, and had a disastrous run as a guest designer for Ungaro from which the house has never quite recovered. She is currently the face of Philippe Plein.
Do you believe Lohan is an effective Monroe impersonator?
Image: Marilyn Monroe.
Loulou de la Falaise, Muse to Yves St Laurent, Dies
The iconic and occasionally controversial inspiration for Yves St Laurent’s style has died at age 63.
Loulou worked with St Laurent from the 1970s until his death, and is credited with having helped him find his ‘look’ – the smoking jacket and the mass of accessories.
De la Falaise was born to French aristocracy in Britain and was called the only true chic Englishwoman of her generation by Cecil Beaton, the photographer. She was one of two major influences on St Laurent – the other was Betty Catroux.
She was one of the design house’s first jewellery designers, a role she continued after St Laurent’s death in 2002 with her own line.
De la Falaise was not wholly liked by the fashion world. In a stunningly inappropriate moment recorded by The New Yorker in 1994, she called Andre Leon Talley, the American Vogue Editor-At-Large, a ‘n—— dandy’ to his face in front of a substantial crowd.
Apparently Talley’s reaction was angry but graceful. He has not commented on her death.
Image: Loulou de la Falaise.
Stylishly yours,
RESCU
