I think you should talk closer to the mic, otherwise I won’t be able to hear you. There’s so much noise in here.
Yeah, it’s a such madhouse. Okay, is it better now?
It’s perfect. Tell me how it all started for you.
I actually started modeling in New York. After a few months there, I got booked for a couple jobs in Paris. I was gonna stick around for a month but I ended up staying forever! I immediately landed really cool jobs, such as the Diesel campaign, Italian Vogue with Steve Hiatt… I basically jumped right into it, litterally!
And what about before that?
I bartended in New York for three years.
Was it like a coyote-girls type of bar, were you dancing on the bar and juggling with the bottles?
No, not really : it was a french café oddly enough…!
Oh, right, not the most appropriate place for that… What’s the big difference between New York and Paris?
New York’s definitely more open, everything’s allowed, no one really cares nor judges you. Paris is a lot more judgemental. Suppose you’re wearing
short shorts, you get looked at up and down like “
how dare you show your legs, ho?”. But there are many positive things about Paris : the beauty of the city, its old-world charm… It has its good days and bad days – there are usually more good days in the summer. Sometimes you’re like “
oh my Gosh, I live in Paris“. Being from a small southern town, it’s kind of living a fairy tale.
What are your upcoming projects? Any plans for the summer?
I’m curating my first art show in Tampa, Florida where I’m from. There’s no theme : it’s kind of just everyone I love and a way to get ‘em all together in one place and show the world their abilities. I still have to figure out a name for the show! There will be some old sketches of my dad, Raquel Nave’s polaroids, some friends’ paintings, etc. It’s nice ’cause the art scene there is small – You have
the model,
the fashion designer,
the gallery owner - so everyone knows everyone, and can feed off each other’s creativity and be supportive.
Is this the first step of a new career?
No, it’s just that I have so many people around that are so creative and are not using it. So I figured I could give them a hand – I would hope someone would do the same for me if they had the right connections. A lot of people just need a kick in the *** to be pulled out of their comfort zone.
Right. So who kicks your butt when you get stuck for too long in your comfort zone?
I kick my own butt, dude! And I have an extremely supportive husband that won’t let me tell myself that I can’t do something.
What’s so great about the fashion world? We keep pretending we hate it, but we can’t live without it.
It’s probably that, eventhough you run into loads of douchebags, it’s easier to weed out the creative minds which are the ones that keep you inspired. Being a model, you get to meet extremely kind, talented people, who eventually become your family, especially when you left yours miles away. So fashion is just a backdrop for us.
Smart. I hadn’t seen it that way. You have to run, right?
Yeah, I have to go to Pilates. Then I’ll smoke two packs of cigarettes and update my blog (click
here for Mollie’s blog).
What other major mags? I also know she was in Tush..
