This cover has a congenial throwback feel for me; very Ralph-Lauren 80s, even though she’s actually wearing Gucci. Clean face, simple hair. Easy. She wears it well and it feels somewhat refreshing. None of this is causing me any agita, and sometimes that’s all you want.
The interview is very pleasant and quite well-written — Gigi comes across as generally thoughtful and likeable, which is generally the aim with these sorts of profiles, but you’d surprised how often it doesn’t really happen. I thought this was sincerely interesting:
“It’s not my job to have an opinion on what I’m wearing [on set],” she says. “It’s my job to wear what I wear and have enough of a photographic mind to understand how to make that piece look good, sellable, and give the feeling that is wanted by the creative team.” I ask her if there’s one photographer in particular whose notes or suggestions have stayed with her. “Steven Meisel is someone who realized my interest early on. He lets me shoot with a mirror behind him. And he says he often starts with letting models do that. The point is not to be distracted by yourself or even look at yourself in the mirror. It’s about being able to look at the camera, and then, kind of in your out-of-focus vision, is the shape of you. It’s training a model to understand how she fits into the photo, which is why I became a model. Obviously, I’m not saying this as anything disrespectful against women, but you have to look at yourself like an object or a fashion object or a sculpture.” She shrugs when I ask her about her relationship to mirrors. “I don’t spend a lot of time in the mirror at all. I brush my teeth in the shower in the morning. Or I usually look out the window.”
This is the kicker of the piece — and it’s a good one, but I’d also read an entire article just about the logistics of literally modeling. (Maybe this is why I liked America’s Next Top Model so much. Someone get Gigi a gig as a judge on Top Model Version 3! Or 4? Whatever. The next one!)
