Valentino SS 2021 (Debut)
vogue
MILAN FASHION WEEK
Meet The Two New British Faces On The Valentino SS21 Runway
BY
ALICE CARY 27 SEPTEMBER 2020
What’s it like to start your modelling career during a global pandemic? Just ask Alex Andrews and Maelona Thomas, the new faces of Next Management who made their runway debuts at
Valentino’s joyous spring/summer 2021 presentation at Milan Fashion Week.
Walking for Valentino is quite the resumé booster, as is receiving a hair cut from renowned stylist, Guido Palau. Both girls were treated to fresh chops from the British scissor master. Andrews’s dad, who is a punk band frontman, was particularly impressed with her new ’do and Thomas, too, was pleased with her shorter trim: “It made me feel more confident to have a change of appearance before I walked out.”
“Alex had a uniqueness in her exemplary face,” Madeleine Østlie, who cast the show along with stylist Joe McKenna and casting director Patrizia Pilotti, tells British
Vogue. “A shy character with big eyes and a startling profile. She reminded me of a timeless decade.” She praised Maelona’s strong jaw and cheek bones, which “matched the strength of the new era.” Maelona took to the runway in a sunshine yellow shirt dress blooming with florals, while Alex made the first exit wearing a sharp black tunic and shorts.
Alex, an 18-year-old Canvey Island native, hardly expected to be exploring the streets of Milan when she celebrated her milestone birthday earlier this year in lockdown. It’s been a weekend of firsts for the model – the Italian trip was the only time she has ever been on an aeroplane. What’s more, during her fitting with Piccioli, she was told that she would be opening the show. “I was trying to focus as much as I could and not think about what I was doing,” she tells British
Vogue, buzzing with post-show excitement. “I thought: If I think about what this is, I’m just going to start smiling.”
Alex was scouted at the age of 14, as she dashed to the Tube with her mum after a 5 Seconds of Summer concert at the Greenwich O2 stadium. “We were given a leaflet, went home and wondered, ‘Is this real?’” she laughs, adding, “Before that, I’d not even thought about it being a possibility. Now here we are!”
For Maelona, it has been quite the whirlwind. She was scouted back in January after she submitted a few shots to different agencies. “It was 4am, I hadn’t slept and I wondered what I was going to do with my degree,” she says. “Then my friend said I had the height to be a model and suggested that I should send some pictures.” Originally from Cardiff – “From the valleys to Valentino,” says Østlie – she is currently in her final year studying sociology at Bristol and is due to return after the show. “I didn’t tell many of my friends about today because it would have probably made me more nervous,” she admits.
The models were tasked with scaling an expansive industrial runway – twice – so both Alex and Maelona were relieved to learn that they would be wearing flats. “It was huge, such a long catwalk,” Maelona remarks. Practise walks up and down a hotel corridor primed the girls for their debut moments, although nothing could prepare them for the emotional experience of the IRL catwalk. Plans to celebrate? “A big meal and a relax,” laughs Alex.
vogue.co.uk
