Size 4 Coco Rocha Asks "How Skinny Is Too Skinny?"

Canadian supermodel Coco Rocha is apparently a young achiever. Aside from rising to the top of the fashion modeling industry, she has also launched the clothing line Rococo.


Now 21, Coco Rocha is a proud size 4 and she admits she is not in demand for the shows anymore. But she does not care either.

"I don't do nudes, I don't do semi-nudes, I don't do cigarette shots. It took me a long time in the business to realize I didn't have to do everything people told me I should if I wanted a career."

Walking in Diane Von Furstenberg's fall show at the recent New York Fashion Week, Coco Rocha holds her head up high against fashion designers and fashion people who continues to abhor "fat" in fashion.

"Everybody knows that, in general, a basketball player needs to be tall and a fashion model needs to be skinny, but how skinny is too skinny?"

The young supermodel who once worked for the likes of Steven Meisel, Marc Jacobs, Jean Paul Gaultier, Chanel, Dior, Prada, and Louis Vuitton admits:

"I'm not in demand for the shows anymore. I've been told to lose weight when I was really skinny. You know what, I've stopped caring. If I want a hamburger, I'm going to have one. No 21-year-old should be worrying about whether she fits a sample size."

Coco Rocha also sees the problem in hiring runway models who are just 14 and 15 years olds and have not yet hit puberty - the type of models who "will add non-negotiable curves to their rail-thin frames."

"Girls are told they're not skinny enough, or they hear, 'She's old, she's boring, we've had her, she's not tiny anymore.' A lot of people don't take into account the vulnerability of these young girls. And the latest crop of models is not made up of adults or even sort-of adults. They are children. Point closed."

Abbey Lee Kershaw Refuses To Walk In McQueen Shoes

Wonder why top runway models Abby Lee Kershaw, Sasha Pivovarova, and Natasha Poly were no-show at the recent Alexander McQueen's Spring 2010 Show?

They chose not to hit the catwalk because they were too terrified to walk in McQueen's "Alien" shoes.


When it comes to wearing clothes and walking in them for runway shows, Abby Lee Kershaw is an expert. She is one of the few models who have earned quiet a reputation for catwalk disasters.

First, she fell at Rodarte's spring 2009 show because of the killer heels. Then she fainted at Alexander McQueen's spring 2009 show because her corset was too tight. And just last February, she almost fell at Rodarte show (again), injuring her knee and was forced to sit the rest of the season out.

So when Abbey Lee Kershaw (and her gang) took one look at McQueen's spring 2010 Alien shoes, she already knew that those are not meant for walking.

But of course, the trio are just few of the privileged models who are able to decline a famous runway show.

The McQueen's spring show did go on and nameless models sashayed the runway in Alien shoes. Though none of them tripped or fell to the floor, they still looked like crying — even behind the prosthetic cheeks and spooky makeup.

Lara Stone Narrates Life As A Curvy Model

Curvy and proud size 4, supermodel Lara Stone talks about her early hardships in the modeling industry in latest Vogue interview.


When you're a model, nobody calls you fat. "What they say is 'curvy' but you know they mean fat," says Dutch supermodel Lara Stone who stands 5'10" and wears a size 4. And the fat label could only get worse. When the stylists started whispering in a corner after trying on clothes for ten minutes, "that is when I know I'm about to be canceled."

Like most fashion models, Lara Stone was scouted in her teens. Back then, she was a "typical angry teenager" with no interest other than cigarettes and dressing up for the Halloween. During one of her family's trip to Paris, she was scouted by an agent in the Métro. She spent a few years in Paris living the typical life of a struggling model — sharing an apartment with five other girls, went on endless casting calls ("Walk. Turn. Walk. Thank you"), and posed for catalog shoots that "paid well but not spectacularly."

By the age of 22, Lara Stone met Derek Dayley, a young agent at IMG who was intrigued by her unconventional looks. "She had been pigeonholed as this pretty, fresh-faced blonde, but I saw something else. She's got this interesting, one-of-a-kind beauty," the agent would later reveal.

The big model agency has helped paved the way for Lara Stone's career. She soon appeared in ad campaigns for Givenchy, Calvin Klein, and Hugo Boss. She also walked the runway for almost every major designer including Marc Jacobs, Balmain, and Isabel Marant.

Despite the success, it is still not easy for a young girl to constantly feel being the different one. And for a size 4 model in the land of size zeros, famous Lara Stone is always considered as the odd one.

"It's depressing when the clothes don't fit and you are always the odd one out... I was on a shoot just last week. And the stylist took out this tight corset dress and said, 'Here, put it on,' and I was like, 'Who are you kidding?' There was no way, so that was very rude of her. It's like, come on, she's a woman; whether you're buying jeans at the mall or wearing couture, you know what it's like for clothes not to fit. It's not an easy kind of rejection, because it's very personal. It's you, your body. You take it to heart."

Despite the "curvy" praises, Lara Stone soon began to feel the pressure of losing weight. She went on diet and exercise, but nothing worked. She even tried pills but stopped because it made her heart race. Eventually, she started drinking alcohol to get through the day.

Still, nobody seemed to notice ("In this job, you're always in different countries with different people.") and soon, Lara Stone's alcohol problems got worse. "I was waking up shaking. I couldn't do anything until I had a drink. I hated it. I didn't like the person I became. Plus, I was looking like absolute shit, waking up with a swollen red face, pimples everywhere," she recalled.

Admitting to herself that she really had a problem, she voluntarily checked into a month-long alcohol rehabilitation program in South Africa. "I thought it would be like a holiday, but it turned out I was in lockdown for 23 hours. It was really not a holiday. It was a lot of therapy, a lot of crying, and a lot of difficult moments," she said.

But the therapy was also successful. She has not had a drink for eight months. And months later, Lara Stone was back on on the scene, an unlikely but rising supermodel strutting her curves and even winning the hearts of fashion critics.

As they say, clothes hang better on a coat hanger but some clothes look better on bodies with "boobs."

Karl Lagerfeld, a fan of the model's fuller figure, says "Lara Stone has a gorgeous woman's body."

Virginia Smith, the fashion market editor of Vogue, says "Lara makes clothes look good. It's refreshing to see her come down the runway. Sometimes I'll call in a piece, it will arrive, and I'll think, Why did I think I liked that? Then I'll remember, Oh, because Lara wore it."

Renowned fashion photographer Mario Testino says "I have never thought of Lara as fat. It is just a matter of different shapes. It reminds me of when I started to work with Gisele; everyone used to think that she was too voluptuous. Look at where she is now!"

Lara Stone, indeed, is in every inch a supermodel at the peak of her career — despite that her size remains an issue.

As for her personal issues, the curvy supermodel just says "I like my job. I don't want to do anything else... People think I'm angry because of my face, or that I'm a sex bomb. I'm neither... People still tell me I'm fat, but when I look in the mirror, that's not what I see."

Supermodel Claudia Schiffer Retires From The Catwalk

Supermodel Claudia Schiffer has revealed to Italian magazine Donna Materna that she will never strut on the runway again. The 39 year-old German beauty says:

"I am finished with the catwalk and I won't miss it. I continue to model and it's a lot of fun – but no more fashion shows."


Instead of gracing the catwalk, the 5'11" leggy model says she would love to be sitting on the front row and check out all the dresses. "I can sit on the side and view the outfits and see all the detail and that suits me fine. It's very enjoyable. I like my new viewpoint," she confesses.

As a supermodel, Claudia Schiffer is most popular in the 1990s. She is the iconic muse of Chanel and walks the runway alongside Cindy Crawford, Linda Evangelista, Christy Turlington, Naomi Campbell, and Kate Moss. She has graced the covers of many fashion magazines and has also appeared in many films and commercials.

After being discovered from a Düsseldorf night club in 1987, Claudia Schiffer has already made an estimated £38million fortune. She has been modeling for almost 20 years but unlike Naomi Campbell, she insists she had enough of strutting.

With homes in London and Suffolk, Claudia Schiffer is now busy off the runway being a mother of two and still a face for many high-fashion campaigns. She says she's leading an "odd" life at the moment, which includes a planned trip to Iraq.

Minimum Age for Catwalk Models Changed to 16

After the banning of skinny models in Spain, modeling continues to revolutionize its image as the minimum age for catwalk models is changed to 16.

This was spearheaded by the Australian Fashion Week organizers who have vowed to prevent the use of a 14-year teen model Monika Jagaciak for the Rosemount Australian Fashion Week. Aside from setting the minimum age requirement to 16, catwalk models are also required to be represented by a modeling agency.

Vogue magazine responded to the call by announcing that it would not feature Monika in its coverage of Australian Fashion Week (AFW). The magazine also reechoed the call for the use of catwalk models who are 16 years and older.

Last year, there was a public outcry when a fashion competition was won by a 12-year old girl so the AFW reviewed the policies of the industry to ensure that the event best served modeling and reflected the modeling community's attitudes towards issues surrounding the fashion industry.

Aside from setting 16 as the minimum age for catwalk models, AFW also requires school-leaving models to have written permission from parents or guardians and school principals. They must also be chaperoned by a representative of a reputable agency. All these and everything perhaps, to remind them that they may be in the catwalk but are still “innocent babies” of the modeling industry.