Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, March 27, 1994 TAG: 9403250212
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 11 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By ROY H. CAMPBELL KNIGHT-RIDDER NEWSPAPERS
DATELINE: PARIS LENGTH: Long
Flying doves are projected on a screen. Soft music plays. And then a tall figure steps on to the darkened stage, standing in front of a painted image of a flower-strewn arch. A spotlight illuminates the figure, swathed in a fuchsia wool swing coat and tucked into dark tights.
It is Linda Evangelista, the world's top-earning model. Down the long runway, Evangelista sashays under the approving eyes of the 2,000 people packed into an auditorium under the Louvre. She looks straight ahead to the end of the runway, where hundreds of cameras are trained on her. She pauses midway, strikes a haughty pose, then resumes her walk. She pauses again at the end for another pose and aims an enchanting smile at the stern-faced fashion editors seated below the photo pit. A brisk turn, then back down the runway she goes, exiting to fevered applause.
Evangelista's turn on the catwalk, executed in 40 seconds, is repeated eight times in the 30-minute Chloe show. For that, during the fall/winter designer previews in Paris last week, Evangelista's paycheck was a cool $10,000.
Nice work if you can get it.
But there are only about a dozen models in the world who, like Evangelista, command such fees for displaying the expensive and extravagant creations of high-fashion designers.
For four weeks every six months, these supermodels, as they are called, jet from fashion capital to fashion capital to star in the month-long rounds of 150 fashion shows in Paris, Milan and New York. Life for them during fashion season is a dizzying mix of fittings, hairstyle and makeup changes, and runway and party appearances.
They appear in six or seven shows daily. Like clay, they are molded every hour or so into the artistic vision of each designer's current fashion statement. Wigs, wild makeup, special lingerie, mad hats, odd shoes and boots, crazy jewelry - these are their stock in trade.
``We are poked and prodded and told to turn this way and that way. It gets very tiring,'' says supermodel Christy Turlington.
Turlington and her peers in the upper echelon of the modeling industry are very well compensated for this ``tiring'' work. Aside from earning a half-million bucks or more each season, they, like some pampered CEOs of major corporations, enjoy major perks, including limousine service, bodyguards, free designer clothes and first-class air travel and hotel accommodations. And of course there is the entree to the best restaurants and exclusive parties.
``They are worth it,'' said Lagerfeld, backstage at Chloe. ``They are very beautiful girls, and they know how to wear the clothes.''
The supermodels are the live Barbie dolls of an industry that hides its business aspects behind the glitzy veneer of glamour. Stocking a show with these high-paid girls, as they are referred to in the business, is itself a statement about a designer's status in an industry where image is everything.
Agencies such as Viva in Paris or Ford and Elite in the United States arrange their assignments and negotiate their compensation packages, but the supermodels are, essentially, self-employed.
Their fees are so high because they - like top Hollywood stars or major sports figures - are in great demand. (Last fall the U.S. designers, seeking to cut costs, tried to slash the fees for all models to $250 per show. The supermodels threatened to boycott the shows and the designers relented.)
The requirement for modeling high fashion: At least 5 feet, 8 inches tall, bone thin yet shapely and beautiful, and - above all - young.
Thousands of women meet those requirements, but to achieve stardom as a supermodel requires more than mere beauty or the right body configuration.
This year's supermodels achieved their status by possessing exotic beauty and that intangible thing called allure or charisma. They are able, each in her own style, to seduce the camera and the audience that sits in judgment each season on the designers' new clothes.
Turlington says that ``allure'' helps the designers to sell millions of dollars worth of clothes, accessories and perfumes. ``We earn our money,'' she said.
Natasha Esche, president of New York's Wilhelmina Agency, agreed.
``If anything, they are underpaid. They make millions for these fashion companies,'' she said in a recent interview. She said most models' careers end before they are 30.
``They have to make as much as they can while they can,'' she said.
Here's a look at how million-dollar runway models earn the big bucks:
Evangelista, who changes her hair styles and hair color more than Madonna, is the ice maiden of the catwalk. She sashays with a dainty stride, not really coming alive until she is just before the cameras. It is then that her eyes light up and a Mona Lisa smile plays upon her lips.
Naomi Campbell, the Jamaican-born and London-reared supermodel, is the bombshell. She models with the hip-throwing strut of a great stripper. More often than not she sports sexy designs that bare some part of her mega-body. While showing her sensual designs, she wears a seductive but aloof expression that says, ``You can look, but you can't touch.'' At the end of the runway, she tosses her hip as she turns as if to say to the photo pack, ``Take that.''
Christy Turlington, whose classic features bring Audrey Hepburn to mind, is elegance personified. On the runway, she performs like a beauty queen hoping to charm the judges into awarding her the crown. Hers is a dainty jaunt with an enchanting smile.
Claudia Schiffer is the jiggle queen of the catwalk. This German-born former Guess? jeans model, with her sex kitten aura and sex symbol body, bounces down the runway, sending the photographers - mostly male - into a wolf-whistling and braying frenzy.
Carla Bruni, the Italian beauty who nearly wrecked Mick Jagger's happy home, is the serene princess. Her trademark is a soft glide down the runway with one hand on her hip and the other swinging at her side.
In another time, Helena Christensen would have been an empress or a queen. The London native's carriage is regal, her eyes deep pools of blue, her smile enchanting. ``Yes, I'm beautiful,'' is the message she beams as she moves down the runway swathed in a king's ransom in designer garments.
Kate Moss, the Calvin Klein discovery who launched last year's waif fashion movement, approaches the end of the runway like a pitiful orphan walking up to ask a stern headmistress for a second helping of oatmeal. But once before the cameras, Moss, who is only 5-feet-7, transforms - mouse into lioness. Suddenly she is erect, her head leaning to the left in a challenging pose, her hand grasping her hip bone. Her exit is haughty, one air-slicing turn, and then she is gone.
Jennie Shimizer is the antithesis of most supermodels. She is Asian and has a boyish figure and tattooed arms. Her performance is sheepish, as though she is embarrassed to be bowing before such a rarefied throng. She even grins as though this was all some big joke.
But there's no joke about taking home $10,000 a show.
by CNB