Becoming a Model

Modeling is a common subject around my social media accounts. And I meant to put this post together for a long time, I share my life in different ways nowadays in being a Model, a Fashion Mixologist, Miss Caipi and a Model Coach. But this weekend I will be judging the “Miss Brazil USA” beauty pageant and I thought would be the perfect time to come out with a post about my modeling experience, my victories, struggles, and how I could keep myself active for 10 years in the business. I will be coming back in time to the beginning and it might take me a few postings to get where I am now, just keep reading until I get there. If you didn’t sign up for my newsletter is a good time to do so you will know when the next chapter is coming.

I am creating this category in the blog as a way to interact with you, share ideas, answer questions and give advice based on my modeling experiences. Please feel free to use the comments and email to communicate with me.

When I start modeling, the business was very different. Online modeling was pretty new, there was no instagram or any of the social medias we have access now, and we had to carry our big books filled with pictures to castings. Today I rarely carry a book anymore, maybe an ipad or most of the time they already have my pictures on file, very important today is having  a good amount of followers in Instagram witch it matters a lot for the industry…. different times!!!

I was never built as a model, I sort of became one. I was a typical Brazilian girl that didn’t have the right height or the right slim body and I was older to start in profession, most of them start pretty young. The only thing I had was what they called an interesting look or “unique” look, and today they even have another name for it “ethnic ambiguous”  and a lot of strength and perseverance that got me where I wanted to get to. I think one of the most important things that has kept me in the business for a long time is the fact that I am a very realistic person. I know where I fit in life and my choices are all based on that fact. This is an important factor in this industry since there are more rejections than anything else. Not all the models will turn in a Adriana Lima, Alessandra Ambrosio or Giselle, Gigi or Kendall. These girls are a very small percentage of the cut.

To make it in the industry I had to change a lot. My eating habits were completely  switched to a healthy lifestyle so I could drop the necessary weight. I worked so hard to improve my skills, practicing my modeling skills and testing with photographers as much as I could to build my portfolio. But there was something that was very important in the requirements that I could not change- “the height.” I am not as tall as most models, which hurt my chances to get jobs in fashion. I will never forget when a photographer explained my look to me and told me how I could survive in the industry. He said I didn’t have the right requirements and, because of that, I should be willing to look for jobs where height would be irrelevant, which limited my options. I always worked really hard to get jobs, if I were waiting for someone to do anything for me I probably wouldn’t have done as much. I can say I really did my aspiring model’s homework  I would spend hours at the bookstore looking at different fashion magazines to see how models would be behave, dress and pose. I read modeling books and famous model’s biographies, specifically the ones that had “unique” looks and made it big, like Gia Carangi and Janice Dickson.

I started to build my portfolio in New York and then some of the  agencies I approached told me would be easier for me to build a stronger book in Europe. In Europe there were more magazines where I could try to get editorial work, and the photographers were also very open to unique looks like mine. Since my brother lives in Germany, I would be able to spend sometime there and try to see if it would work. I didn’t have any connections in the industry overseas and I used some modeling sites to make connections with photographers since online modeling was about to get big. So I packed up all my things and headed to Europe for a new modeling adventure.

Stay tuned for the next post where I will share all my stories from my time in Europe. Use the comments to ask questions and share your opinions, and if you like this post use the share buttons to spread the word around…

See you next time!!!