In picking their latest BONDS girl, the Australian underwear powerhouse have backed a winner. Shanina Shaik is stunning. She has big Bambi eyes, framed by improbable lashes, a sweetheart face, and perfect, pouty lips. The composition of her features would appear almost forlorn were it not for the crackle in her personality, the tendency to break into broad grins and contagious giggles.
Born in Melbourne, Shaik has been working steadily as a model for several years in Australia and New York. But it wasn't until 2011 that the world really caught onto her. She got her serious break when she was selected to walk in the Victoria's Secret runway show. Last year, she was one of only two Australians to walk. The other was Miranda Kerr.
Straight from the spangles of VC, she jetted to Paris, where she stole the show at Chanel's Paris-Bombay themed pre-Autumn collection. That Lagerfeld had that year chosen to cast several girls of South Asian heritage (Shaik's own background is a melting pot of Australia, Lithuanian, Pakistani and Saudi heritage), gave the model a chance to speak out on an issue that is important to her: Diversity in fashion.
She is unafraid to address fashion's whitewashing tendency, and is optimistic for a more veri-hued future between glossy pages.
Shanina Shaik is also, as you might expect of a BONDS girl, very, very sexy. She more than holds her own, solo, in their latest TVC (debuted above), for the brand's new Rolltop underwear style.
We caught up with Shaik on-set at the Bonds campaign late last year, where clad in a fluffy white robe and colourful Bonds undies, she talked about what shooting for an Australian icon means to her, and the under-representation of mixed race models.
You don't get to come back to Australia that often anymore do you?
No not really, I'm living in New York full time. It's so nice to be home right now. I feel immediately relaxed, I have my family here. And then to be coming back for this, to do Bonds, I've been wearing Bonds since I was little, so to do the campaign feels incredible.
When you were a kid, did you ever look at the girls in the Bonds campaigns and think "I wanna do that"?
Yes actually! I thought they were so pretty. I remember one of the girls was wearing all white singlet and briefs, and she was quite dark, and that really stands out to me because when I'm really tanned and in Bonds I feel at my sexiest. That was my favourite one.
You walked the Chanel cruise show, can you tell me about that?
The Chanel show was kind of Indian inspired, sort of Bombay themed clothes and the set up was so beautiful. The attention to detail was amazing. But most of all I loved how the girls were chosen, it was great to see Indian girls and mixed kind of girls doing a show. You hardly ever see that in Paris.
Is the under representation of South Asian girls in fashion frustrating for you?
It does actually bother me quite a bit. I think there's so many beautiful mixed and South East Asian girls and sometimes i don't think we really get the chance to show our potential. People will cast for one certain look. Hopefully that changes. That's why I liked the Chanel show so much, Karl Lagerfeld chose mixed and Indian looking girls and we finally had the chance to do our own thing, to show our stuff.
You all looked amazing. What do you think has lead to this lack of diversity in the past?
I don't know, fashion goes through certain looks and phases. The nineties were about the main supermodels, there's a trend towards stories with curvier girls at the moment, which is great, but also critiques of the 'super skinny' look. People wonder why models have to be so thin, and they say the answer is because it makes girls look like coat hangers, but that's just a trend to. I guess people constantly cast caucasian girls because it has worked in the past, because it's a way to have the same look for every girl, but clothes change, the people who wear them change, and I think this single colour look is just a phase too, and it's going to change. I really think it's going to change.
So you want to see more diversity?
Yes. Diversity is beautiful. There are so many beautiful women from different countries and I don't think we should ever concentrate on just one type of look, because there's so much more in the world to represent than that!
Can you tell me about your life in New York?
I've been there for nearly three years now, I have my own place in Manhattan, and I really enjoy the energy there. There's something special about it. I'm constantly travelling though, I'm hardly ever there. It keeps me really busy, but I really enjoy it. Being on planes is basically my hobby!
How do you deal with all the rapid changes?
I just try and drink water, keep healthy. I always wanted to travel though, so it's been an easy adaption. Going to Paris was amazing. Being in the middle of this high fashion world was so exciting for me. And just getting to work in all these beautiful locations. Going out really far into the wilderness with no mobile receptions or anything, it's kind of annoying, but so exciting.
You've now done Victoria's Secret, which is a bit of a career maker. How did you handle that pressure? And the pressure to look a certain way?
Obviously you need to exercise a bit before hand, but it was not so much about dealing with pressure as resisting with confidence, that's what the working out was about, feeling strong. I didn't have to try and lose any weight, just be healthy and exercise, which is a job requirement of being a model anyway.
Working in such an image-centric industry, do you have any strategies for dealing with let downs, and keeping that confidence?
When you model you hear a lot of 'no'. 'You can't do this,' or 'You'll be rejected because of this…' I've found the best thing to do is just be around positive people. People who are happy in themselves, who can help you not take that sort of decision so personally. What I know now is that designers are after a certain look each season, and when someone says no to you, it's got nothing to do with you, or who you are, it's all about what they are looking for, for that image, for that season. I've really taken that in. When I walk out of a casting, I know I've done my best, and it's out of my head.
I don't mean to get to personal, and tell me if I'm crossing lines here, but you are dating one of the most handsome men in the world at the moment (Tyson Beckford)…
Yeah, he is handsome.
We met on the show Make Me A Supermodel in Sydney, and then lost touch for a while, but what brought us together again was just friendship, we like our quality time together, he just believes in me a lot, to work in New York, that's how that started. But we were friends long before we ever started dating.
Does he help you with work?
A lot of people ask that! We have our careers separately, but he does give me advise when I ask. He's just very supportive, very proud of me, and that's about it. When I go home from work it's just me as me, and him as him. It's a normal relationship (laughs)
What's the best piece of advice he's ever given you?
Not to ever give up on myself. I really worked on that this year, everyone has stages of self doubt, and his confidence in me showed me how to overcome mine… oh, and maybe for the VS show that I needed to work out (laughs)
Can you tell me how you spend your down time?
I have almost none! I really only just want to mellow out, because I so rarely get time off. Just the usual things, I go out with friends, I hide at home watching TV. I have a weekly Zoomba class…
Favourite show?
I love Millionaire Matchmaker, with Patti Stanger. I've met her before and I really want to get advice from her, but at the same time I really DON'T want to get advice from her. Oh and True Blood, and How To Make It In America, which is basically Entourage.
How will you spend your time back home?
I'm a Melbourne girl, and really family oriented, and I just can't wait to get down there and spend a lot of time with them. I hardly get to see my family. I have three brothers, all younger than me!
Is it weird for your eighteen year old brother to have a sister who is this successful lingerie model?
No. I mean, because they're boys they don't get that into it. It's like 'oh, my sister does lingerie, whatever'.
Do his friends have crushes on you? Do they tease him?
No! I don't think so… My mum made him watch the show the other day though, and he was really proud of me, which was very touching.
What would you love to be doing ten years from now?
I think, I would like to maybe be a VS Angel, get my wings. I also want a Vogue cover. It would be so good to see a South East Asian, or gosh, just a mixed kind of exotic girl on the cover of Vogue. Other than that, all I really want is to be healthy and happy.
Now, your type of beauty is in one sense very exotic, and different from what we're used to seeing, especially in Australia, but you're also extremely conventionally beautiful. What would you suggest to girls who are going to hold you up as an ideal that they can't live up to?
You can't do that! God (Here, Shaik looks genuinely, almost imploringly frustrated). I mean, my friends and I were talking about this the other day, and the thing is, we look a certain way, yes, and that makes a lot of girls think "Oh, she must never get bullied, or get rejected or anything" and it's just not true. It happens. It especially happens when you're not confident and settled in yourself, no matter what way you look. And to be honest, everyone looking different, and owning that, is what makes the world interesting. It's not good to look like everybody else, it's boring.
So is it fair to say being a certain level of gorgeousness won't make you happier?
No! Looks don't get you anywhere with how you feel. Being positive and confident does. And when it comes to guys, to be honest, what they care about is confidence and self respect. You can have a disgusting personality, and look gorgeous, and it's not going to get you anywhere with them, at least not for long. Ultimately, what's on the inside is going to shine through.
HAPPY BiRTHDAY SHANINA!!! wishing you all the best on your special day, hope you continue to get more beautiful on the inside and out in the years to come. Never change your attitude, you are an amazing role model to all the young girls out there that doubt themselves because they do not feel beautiful and only think the outside counts. And of course, good luck for fashion week 
you will do great!
