The Catwalk of Your Life?

The other day I was thinking about my time as a catwalk model and how, in those days, each designer fashion show had a bridal finale.  No matter what the collection was like, it culminated in a bridal dress finishing the show and every model vied for the opportunity to be the bride as it was literally the icing on the cake of the show.  It would be the most beautiful, the most expensive and most coveted dress in the show and it was the ultimate compliment to be chosen as you were inevitably photographed with the designer as you escorted him or her off the catwalk after their curtain call.  

I had the good fortune to be a bride in many fashion shows and it made me think what it must feel like on a bride’s wedding day to have that experience for the first, and hopefully last, time!  How many women wear a long dress, high heels, a veil, carry a bouquet and have the eyes of their friends and family on them down the aisle and the rest of the day?  The bride is the star of the show just like a designer catwalk show and she, above anyone else, wants to glide down the aisle seamlessly with confidence, elegance and great posture.  But where do you go to get this kind of advice? 

Well, I’ve spent years being a model and years training young girls who want to be a model and I thought brides to be are under even more pressure than young models to look great in their wedding gown, heels, veil, with cameras coming at them from every angle throughout the whole day.  This is a lot of pressure for someone who may not have worn heels and a long dress before.  Even models who have done a bit of modelling would struggle with this kind of pressure with the eyes of friends and family watching their every move.  Then you have to pose for the photos and look at them for the rest of your life…whether you like them or not!  What you may not realise is that you have quite a bit of control over the outcome of your photos if you know a few simple techniques of the professionals.  It can make all the difference between a good photo and an awful one and if you know your best angle, you can offer that up to the photographer instead of the photographer trying to find it for you are under pressure with time constraints and hungry guests.

So, instead of having the same kind of hen party, invite me to spend a couple hours with you and your bridesmaids and girlfriends.  We will learn how to walk in high heels elegantly and without pain,  how to pose for the camera, techniques for staying calm no matter what goes wrong and how to enjoy every moment of your special day.  We will have a lot of laughs, learn lots and you will go home feeling and looking better with no headache in the morning!

www.thebridalcoach.moonfruit.com

Catwalking with Jay Alexander & Zac Posen

OK…by now you know that I am more interested in what goes on behind the scenes, where the magic is created.    I’ve always been more interested in how the magician does the trick…not how the trick looks.  So, while I was in New York I had the opportunity of watching the rehearsal for the Zac Posen show choreographed by Jay Alexander, you know, the guy from America’s Next Top Model.  Well, I say guy but he prefers to confuse us with his sexuality by wearing a lot of female clothes and hairstyles.  The question amongst my contemporaries is “Can a man really teach a woman how to walk?”  The jury is still out on that question but you can guess how I feel about it!

Anyway, designers sometimes hire high profile choreographers to set the show and encourage the models to walk less like robots and more like women and Jay is a pro at that.  He gets the whole room going as you can see in the clip, so much so that Zac Posen himself just couldn’t stay in his seat and had to get up and have a go.

Not all shows are choreographed.  In fact, most times the girls are told to walk up and down, do not turn, stop at the end of the catwalk for the ‘money shot’ (the photographer’s pen at the end of the catwalk)

The money shot!

and come back and leave…much different than my day when we actually did a show.  I guess I interpret the word show literally, like a Broadway or West End show where you actually entertain the audience instead of put them to sleep…but that is just one woman’s opinion.  Usually all you get backstage now is a large sign telling you what to do in a few adjectives and perhaps a chart of how they want you to walk.

Catwalk chart instructions

This chart I found back stage at the Diane von Furstenberg show and as you can see they weren’t even told to stop for the money shot.  I guess photographers have invented better ways of photographing models on the move. 

 

 

The other surprise for me was that models now just wear one outfit, that’s right, I said one outfit.  We used to wear at least 3 and up to 7 outfits per show so there were fewer models and more changes.  Some of us actually built our reputations on changing quickly.  The quicker you changed, the more outfits you were given and the more times you got to go on the catwalk.  Needless to say, I was one of the quickest changers in the business!

 

 

It doesn’t really make economic sense to hire 45 models for one show and give them each one outfit to wear but then fashion has never really been economical.