You know how models always say they have hardship in their lives and they face adversity? Well, Selena Breed—a face of Lancôme—really did! I mean, not like disaster-level adversity, but the career kind. Like when they tell you you’ll never make it.Here’s part II of our Starbucks interview.
Q. You were getting modeling jobs from the age of eight on because people would spot you and want you to model for them. What kinds of jobs were they?
A. "I did some local runway shows, catalog shoots, local newspaper jobs, things like that. It was all through my mom, though, I didn’t have an actual agent."
Q. But it must have been easy to land one when you got older, right?
A. "Wrong! I walked into an agency when I was 17, thinking modeling was what I really wanted to do with my life, and they turned me down flat. They said I could never do fashion shoots—I was an athlete in high school, so I was muscular and not at “model weight,” that’s what they said! They also told me that, at 17, I was getting a little old."
Q. But then you went to college at the
A. "I pretty much defied the rules that I was too old or the wrong body type. Elite liked some photos of me that a photographer brought in, so they signed me. That agency sent me to
Q. Ooh, how was your first Fashion Week?
A. "Not pleasant! I was not at all used to going on the hellacious numbers of go-sees and castings they give you/ I got a lot of “You need to practice your walk” comments. I though I could walk! I had done shows, so I was like, “What?” I did book a few shows though, with up-and-coming designers. They let you have facial expressions, walk the way you feel like walking—they let you be you more than the bigger designers do, I later discovered. I didn’t fit into the fashion crowd, but I’ve worked through that now, and I’m okay with it."
--MW
Melissa Walker's new book, Violet by Design, comes out Tuesday. For now, read excerpts on ELLEgirl Mobile.
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