I’ve always wanted to be in the fashion world. Whether it was modeling, being a designer, an editor of Marie-Claire magazine or a writer for Vanity Fair, I knew I didn’t want to be a typical high school student. I didn’t want to grow up to be a lawyer or doctor, or a teacher or work in the alumni office, no. When my friends were dreaming about an internship at Lenox Hill Hospital, I was dreaming about working under designer Betsy Johnson. I was first intrigued about fashion when I saw the designs of Roberto Cavalli’s 2010 spring collection and photographs displaying beautiful models in Vogue, shot by Patrick Demarchelier. As I learned more and more about these designer’s jobs, the more I wanted to become part of their world. Now, at age 14, after perfecting my cat eye eyeliner, and mastering the art of hair curling, I’m ready to go on go-see’s as a teen model. I think I realized the less materialistic aspect of fashion after learning about Coco Channel, and to this day I stand by her quote, “Fashion is not something that exists in dress only. Fashion is in the sky, in the street, fashion has to do with ideas, the way we live and what is happening”.
I never imagined how nerve wrecking my first photo shoot would be, so when the time came for me to walk in front of that camera, I was in for a surprise. I walked into the photographers loft, not knowing what to expect; Will he like me? What if I’m not pretty enough? Before I could psyche myself out anymore, the make-up artist immediately greeted me, leading me to the makeup and hair station. For two hours, I was poked and prodded at with every make-up brush you could imagine. The make-up artist defined and sculpted every part of my face from contouring my cheekbones to highlighting my forehead. Then came the hair. In my opinion, I have a pretty high tolerance for pain; however, having your hair yanked, pulled, straightened, curled and hair sprayed for two hours is pretty brutal. After my hair and make-up was done, I started to panic. I thought to myself, “Now it is time to actually work!”. I have never felt so scared in my entire life; however, once I got in front of the camera, I suddenly felt at ease. The photographer was extremely nice and understood that it was my first real photo shoot. He gave me directions like, “Chin up, relax your hand, turn your body to the left” but he also told me to do whatever felt natural. The whole photo shoot was a total of 4 hours. During those long 4 hours I had to try my best to suppress my anxiety because every emotion that went through my mind would be portrayed in my face and the photographer would point it out. After the photo shoot was over, and I thanked the make-up artist and photographer for their time, I was able to leave feeling good about myself: I was unaware of the rejection that lie ahead of me.
You always hear about rejection, but you never really know how it feels until it actually happens. In every magazine like Cosmopolitan and Seventeen, it tells you how to deal with rejection. It tells you to cry when you are dumped by a boy and do whatever it takes to make you feel better (which usually involves a spoon and a carton of Ben and Jerry), but my experience was a little bit different. Although everyone has been rejected at some point in their life, modeling rejection pulls on a whole different set of emotions. My first rejection was for a campaign in an Abercrombie and Fitch advertisement. I was obviously extremely excited when my agency called me and told me that they were interested in seeing me, so like any other first time model, I assumed that I would 100% get the job. Evidently, I was wrong. I went to the casting in a black tank top and jeans, the required dress code for this go-see. Immediately I was intimidated by the 20-something year old models that towered over me at heights that I thought only Big Foot could obtain. When I was called into the casting room, the Abercrombie and Fitch representatives took my pictures and told me to be serious, then smile, then turn to the left, then right and so on and so forth. After the casting, I was so confident that I had gotten the job. I waited, and I waited, and I waited for the e-mail confirming what I already thought was true. After a while I did get an email, but it wasn't the one I was hoping for. It was an e-mail for another casting. At first I was a little bit confused, had I gotten the job and now they were trying to get me even more jobs? Did I not get the first job? The next time I went into the agency to have a meeting, my agent told me that though Abercrombie and Fitch liked my look, I was too young. She told me that I was going to get rejected a thousand times before I would get job. This new of course, was undeniably disappointing. Though all I felt like doing was dropping to the floor and crying, I instead used this rejection to motivate me and continue on my journey as a teen model.
