from times online
Posing in heels and little else was surprisingly liberating
Laura Bailey, one of the faces of M&S, reveals she enjoyed appearing nearly naked for a good cause
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Today it is easier to be cool and green than cool and not green. I hope that I can stay stylish and environmentally friendly; I didn’t wake up one day with a sudden urge to buy a pair of ethical shoes, but I’ve started asking questions about where, and under what conditions, my clothes are manufactured. Marks & Spencer is a quiet but powerful environmental pioneer; it is proving that you can have fast fashion with a conscience. I believe that its Plan A initiative is a blueprint for future fashion production. Then there are designers such as Stella McCartney who have always had very sound principles ethically and environmentally. She has always stuck to her guns, which I admire.
I was old when I started modelling. It’s a cliché, but an agent spotted me on Kings Road when I was 22. I was fresh out of university and had never considered modelling. My first job was to pose as a young Britt Ekland for a book launch. I’d like to think that my life would not be so different without the modelling – though obviously there would be fewer pictures and fewer parties. I didn’t think my son would make the connection between me in person and my billboard images, but he used to stop, point and say, “Mother”. I thought that it was so sweet until I realised that he was doing it with all blonde girls.
I haven’t had any embarrassing modelling moments per se, but I’ve had plenty of weird ones, most of them involving extremes of temperature. I had always wanted to go to Venice, preferably when I was in love, but I ended up on the Grand Canal fearing that I might be swept to my death – or to get to it via hypothermia.
I’ve never been one of those models who can just strip off in the middle of the studio, but the nude photoshoot for 4 Inches [a book in which beautiful women posed in high heels, and little else, to raise money for the Elton John Aids Foundation] was surprisingly liberating.
Anorexia is such a serious issue, but people can’t just blame the media. It’s so dangerous to oversimplify the problem. Yes, newspapers and magazines need to have a responsible attitude to so-called ideal female images, but the problem runs much deeper than that. I’m an ambassador for Barnardo’s and constantly work with teenagers who have problems; believe me, they’re not obsessed with thin girls in the media. Models are an easy scapegoat.
