Rejoice.

Never knock down a newcomer as a one-trick one-season wonder before she's debuted in print. Ever. This is the lesson whirlind of a model Arizona Muse has learned me and I'm willing to stick by it so I won't be missing out on watching the evolution of another up-and-comer of her caliber (if any) any time soon. I assume I don't need to go about typing down Arizona's resume ; other blogs have and will better than I ever could. In a nutshell she's been working for three years but has only started burning up the fashion industry this season, and... she's got a baby. Chill out, I'm not heading down mundane debates lane (isn't she too young? irresponsible? selfish?), nor am I willing to expound upon her personal life, but being cognizant that she hasn't left everything behind so as to get her face plastered all over Vogue Italia is a thought I deem comforting - not to mention it takes someone who has a good head on their shoulder to be fully aware of the fickleness of the fashion industry and not to get invested into it at all costs.

To a certain extent, knowing that insignificant bit lulls me into thinking Arizona doesn't fall into the category of girls ready to write off their off-duty lives so as to keep the pace with the industry they happen to work in and God know there's nothing more miserable than self-dismissive, obsessively aspiring demeanors (at least to me). I've earned this repulsion through witnessing countless wannabes trying to make it into any industry whatsoever undergoing ludicrous make-overs so as to stay relevant, but at the end of the day it felt so like self-denial that it took away all the authentic freshness they had embodied at some point. Here's to hoping Arizona never gets tempted into changing drastically basically, for it would truly affect my love for her and her work. She stands out to me because she is so malleable as a model and yet so genuinely and unassumingly herself. She can be the vehicle by which photographers convey their vision and remain recognizable by means of her infectious smile, her sophisticated stance, and her risky posing above all.

Poses happen to impart much more significance to the way we look at the clothes than we realize. When clothes just hang down a body we're kind of bullied into seeing them but all in all we're so bombarded with different aesthetics and cuts and patterns that there's nothing left to do but gloss over the whole without absorbing anything at all. When a model dares to try out eccentric poses, not only can she cancel out the staidness of studio photography and the one-note goal it strives for, but she also draws your eyes into concentrating away from the garments upon the lines of her body and the intricacy of its angles first, then back upon the fashion and all its subjacent details per se. Not to mention a mannequin who has no setting to work off of and who still gets to do the clothing a favour solely within the limitation of her body commands respect, doesn't she? And well, correct me if I'm wrong but I think Arizona is slowly yet firmly entrenching herself within the model who masters the art of posing type. Her postures give off such a determined fortitude, an unwavering dominance, that even poses that could look contrived at first cursory glance come across as bluntly immanent to her body language. Only a model who's well-versed in her own body can carry this off.

I'm finally starting to comprehend the why of the Arizona Muse phenomenon. I couldn't wrap my head around her sudden blow-up in the first place, but I've gradually grown to see the wow-factor that was overshadowed by her unpolished runway appeal. Sometimes - no, often, success in modelling doesn't boil down to looks. I know it would sound paradoxical to anyone not dissecting the fashion industry, as well as I'm certain mannequin connoisseurs will grasp my point. You know a model is great when you can peel away the prettiness - or look past the absence of that for that matter - and still get enough fodder to chew on and ramble about. Blatant beauty can be irksomely depthless and unexciting, while presence... presence is an unexplainable and complex power that pulls you in and keeps your level of fascination up. Being a talented model, it's being versatile enough to be capable of taking on a myriad of characters all the while being detached from this all enough to cling to your individuality and let your idiosyncratic presence pierce through the layers of artifice. I do reckon presence and consequently personality win out over beauty. Arizona perfectly exemplifies it.

source : scanned by push @ tFS

Lost in Hollywood.

Yay! The first double-page shot of the campaign I was most awaiting has eventually leaked out. The last advert that made me feel such an unbridled reaction of visual awe was lensed by Mert and Marcus and sported the creations of a certain Miuccia Prada aswell... there must be a theme here. It seems like Miu Miu never fails to hit the nail on the head in terms of ads. I love that the spirit of the collections always translates onto them without any emanating sense of monotony or sloppiness, and I equally find myself admiring their capability of moving freely along a nuanced spectrum of models castings, going from one pole to another ; from newcomers to established models, including rising stars aswell. This season we get Polish model Kasia Struss, reported to keep company with Sasha Pivovarova and Querelle Jansen (double yay!), whose pictures have yet to surface.

That line-up seems pretty neat to me. Neither Querelle, who's coming back from the void after a few years' absence, nor Sasha walked this season's show, but they've been featured in Miu Miu and Prada campaigns in the past, respectively. I would somehow not lumped in Kasia under the Miu Miu girl category (then again, what is a Miu Miu girl?) but she's both exceeded my expectations and beaten up my a prioris here. And if you're well-versed enough in her career, it musn't be lost on you that she's actually sustained a solid collaboration with the brand since her debut season - it may not stick out as much as other label-model pairings, such as Freja and Chanel or Sigrid and Calvin Klein, but it does exist (less constantly so, though). She first made her way in the Spring Summer 2007 show, sat out the four following ones, fought her way back into the casting in Spring Summer 2009 and has grown into a regular of the brand ever since. Therefore, if you can't take anything from this all, it's that this season's Miu Miu girl is patient and self-possessed ; she can wait until an optimum opportunity to gain momentum passes by and is able to grasp it dexterously.

A tFS member laid out his own interpretation of these first pictures released and although I don't apprehend the campaign as he did, I can value his comment for being so insightful and putting forward a take on the shots I hadn't envisonned. This is the beneficial aspect of this forum (and all places up to public discussions) and its appealing to a wide array of people ; anyone can step up on their soapbox and render their valuable points accessible to others. As far as I'm concerned I had to carry over my own thoughts onto this blog for fear of cluttering up The Fashion Spot from being too wordy.

I find the idea of encircling the models within mirrors to be beyond brilliant, especially when you know about the impetus behind the collection, namely stardom and celebrity - two (one actually) concepts largely ubiquitous in our lives whether we try to face away from them or not. In my mind's eye, Kasia's different angles reflected in the mirrors are the signifiers of the numerous - whether they be interviews, redcarpet or magazines-ready - personaes mainstream personalities have to take on to gloss over the human being (and its flaws) lurking underneath, while the latter, embodied by Kasia, is caught up amid all those made-up images ricocheting off each other. These photographs raise a callous issue bound to rear up that a lot of people lose sight of (don't they..?) when dreaming up schemes to make it in any stardom-related industry : going down the route of fame goes hand in hand with taking the risk of losing the essence of your being in the process, through the onslaught of public eye and what it demands in return for its interest in you - that's to say enough substance, whether it be praise-worthy or scandalous, genuine or not, to get it talking. This idea of self-loss is made even more poignant by means of the bewildered impuissance conveyed by Kasia's expression and haphazard posing.

This actually brings to mind (I apology in advance but I just have to sneak that in) a most well-known text of Sartre's, The Waiter. He spells out in it that the role you get into every day in order to live up to others' standards and expectations will, in the longrun, insidiously encroach upon your true self to the point where you mix up who you are and who you play at being. It's indeed a risk we all run as soon as we step out into society, but this is a plague even more pervasive in the life of a celebrity who gets continuously pressured into projecting a fully put-together image that isn't necessarily in accordance with reality.

Don't get me wrong though. I thought I'd dwell on this campaign because of its ominously inspirational quality solely. Lord knows that I've had more than enough of that asinine, afflicting stardom culture. Then again, I wonder who is to be blamed... Celebrities themselves or the sea of celebrities worshippers? Eternal conundrum, isn't it.

source : scanned by style_expert @ tFS ; vogue.com ; wwd.com

Mélancolie urbaine.

(Before I lay out all my thoughts, I'll let you know that this post might seem lacklustre to you possible reader since it all in all hasn't much to do with the substance I've picked out to accompany my writing. Consider yourself forewarned - and apologies for this!)

I've been hell-bent on being a loyal purchaser of Vogue Paris through thick and thin, and I might not regret it when I'm back to poring over old issues of mine within the years to come. Yesterday I randomly fell upon their June 2005 issue, which had been tucked away in a shelve of mine probably since I got it. I can actually remember buying it off eBay in 2007 just for collection's sake, for both the cover and contents looked pretty coarse to me back then (and to be frank, over-tanned Demi Moore is still not the most appealing sales argument Carine has come up with).

Well, all in all, this encounter with the magazine proved to be a much more enjoyable experience than I thought it would be. I'm in a kind-hearted mood enough not to expound upon the infamous lieu commun "[back issues of magazines] are like wine they get better with time" but this saying is a great summation of the first thoughts that crossed my mind. I was definitely shown that you can't fully soak up the current fashion when caught up within the whirlwind of trends that rages as of the moment. You grow cognizant of the fashionable quality of magazines / collections a certain number of seasons after they hit the shelves / runways, when you can finally value them for what they are and not what you were expecting or willing them to be. The rediscovery of this issue actually took on an introspective significance as I was reminded the fashion enthusiast I was back in 2007.

It was peculiar to find myself gazing at pictures I would have literally disdained four years ago, while some of the pictures that used to leave me awestruck felt incredibly trite within my page-turning. For instance I laid eyes on one of the shot of the Chanel Spring / Summer 2005 campaign which I used to glorify - not only did I feel a tangible aversion to it this time around, but it also learned me why I've kind of hated most of location-shot Chanel campaigns of this past decade. If Karl's going to shoot outside, he can at least decides on doing so in France because - take a d-e-e-p breath - Chanel was born in France before being the widely-spread brand it is known to be nowadays. Not that I am uptightly patriotic, not that Lagerfeld should be burnt at the stake for displaying Chanel clothes in New York, but I still find myself a little appaled at people's unwillingness to stick to their roots - in general that is. Globalization was pleasant before starting to take away the cachet and idiosyncracy of every country, before bringing to being a flat and overpowering world culture (which I'm fully complicit in, much to my dismay). And while Vogue Paris dedicating an issue to American fashion (as they have done in regards to Russia, Brasil or China) seems to me like an in-depth study written from a French point of view, a Chanel campaign lensed in South America or Los Angeles appears like crossing out the French spirit that is full part of the brand.

On a brighter note, I was positively thrilled that my soft spot for this editorial of Daria's hasn't died out after all these years. Photographed by Mario Sorrenti and styled by Emmanuelle Alt, I love it for its self-reflective quality, which is eminently patent on the shot of Mrs Werbowy with her head affectedly leaning forward. The detachment portrayed all throughout the story could easily come around in us mere mortals' life. This is one of these lonesome moments you experience when you retreat back into yourself and ponder over your existence : your past, your future, but your present above all. What you are, what life and your surroundings have made you grown into and what you would have liked to grow into. In spite of the laid-back styling and Daria's nonchalant persona coming through, the story isn't devoid of tension. The casualness of this all collides with the intricacy of the process that goes into self-analysis, which is itself mirrored through the travel between frownings and eased-up expressions (for musings can be as soothing as desolating). This is such an enchanting editorial in that there is a storyline underneath all this sleek leather and raw denim and you can get a sense of a wide spectrum of emotions. Every shot can stand on its own in addition to working in concert with the other ones.

Spreads such as this one are delectable reminders about Vogue Paris not always being the forcedly tongue-in-cheek publication it tends to be mistaken for. Carine started latching onto the over-sexualized aesthetic that has come to characterize the magazine as a whole towards the second midst of her editorship. Prior to that, you'd get Liya Kebede by Corinne Day or Jessica Miller by Sorrenti within one issue, an no trace of Terry Richardson arising from it to boot. I find it really saddening that Mrs. Roitfeld intended so determinedly to make her stamp by founding (and limiting) her work upon recycling oh-so-hype stereotypes as to French people being free-spirited not shying away from cigarettes and erotism all the while beating up dress codes and managing to look classy doing so. It may have come off as daring and invigorating to begin with, but by dint of using up this cliché, this publication got stale and try-hard, it gradually lost its witty substance. Whoever the new editor in chief will be, I hope with all my might they drift away from the road Carine Roitfeld went down in her last days, and get the magazine back to being effortlessly risky with a twist of intellect.

source : westmagz.com via kasper! @ tFS

On the passage of time.

While starting off writing this article, I swear I was meaning to touch on a topic related with neither Steven Meisel nor Vogue Italia (because I'm under the impression I've already touched on both of them a bajillion times) - but then their January 2011 cover emerged within sight and I couldn't help but give in. This is such a pictorial image, pastel-colored yet far away from being corny, reminiscent of long-gone fashion eras yet anything but rehashed-looking.

This cover actually stands out due to the opposition you can draw up between the overall feel of it and its components took apart. Paradoxically enough, it echoes back to the past and yet it's firmly pinned down in the present : on the one hand you have the setting, the numbers held up by both mannequins and the color palette that bring you back to the 40's, on the other hand you can spot two pieces from the Chanel Spring / Summer 2011 collection, two of today's most en vogue models and the 2011 Allure words printed below the picture. When you strip away all its aesthetic value, you can begin to feel the underlying issue that's raised by the covershot : time within fashion and to a further extent, within life.

I'm aware I might be sounding like I completely missed the point of this photograph, but what most drew my eyes in is the kinetic figure in the background. It is so loaded with significance that it makes it tough to just see it. It appears like the signifier of the most menacing characteristic of time, namely its invincible restlessness : what is right now will be gone a second later (and what's in as of now will grow outdated next season). However detached from time you're willing to be, it won't stop it from slipping away ; the more you try to cling to it and hold it back to you, the more it drags you down into its nomadic course. Whatever you do, you lose, for struggling against time equates to struggling against the unknown, an unpalpable might you get put through but can't begin to describe let alone fight off.

I think this adds a brilliant touch to the picture because it also seems to question the primary purpose of photography. Prior to being an art or a hobby, it intends to capture and document fleeting moments so they're never fleeting anymore. It's utilized as a medium to keep a semblance of a chockehold on time (and is a nice testimony of what human beings are capable of thinking up to leave bits of themselves behind), but if you keep in mind that this bustling silhouette is the depiction of the continous passage of time, you're elusively reminded how much of a deceit photography is. You don't capture an instantaneous moment but an image of it ; photography doesn't enable you to immortalize the instant but only provides you with a stagnant representation of it. Magritte called it the Treachery of Images in regards to painting, but this is also applicable to all the recording means that have surfaced ever since.

As for the models choice, it earns an A+ from me. If you are either an Arizona or a Freja follower, you have probably witnessed their blossoming friendship and this should leave you as eager as I am to see how this possible chemistry between them will translate onto the main editorial (assuming and hoping they were commended to interact with each other). I personally don't belong to Arizona's fandom (not yet) but she's slowly been growing on me by means of the solid printwork she's put out and there's undoubtedly potential to be tapped in her. Besides, you may have felt how big of a Freja fan I am, so it should be enough of an explanation to back me up, but I still feel like trying to throw light on why.

I think that one of the greatest factors in keeping me hooked on Freja is her constancy in terms of persona. Working amidst a hubbub constantly moving on from the past, she embodies the sustainable force who not only sticks around but also takes on increasing importance all the while remaining the same at heart - and even through the image she projects. All throughout her most prosperous years (from late 2008 up until now) she's stayed true to the nonchalance she's crafted and that has basically taken part in making a true brand off of herself. Funnily enough, just when you think the inconceivable success she's been gaining is likely to get to her head and gets you wondering if it will cause her to change wholly, she seems to reach her peak of steadiness - untouched hairstyle, immutable streetstyle, pervading casualness.

This is a comforting feeling indeed, to know that you can count on one model at least to provide you with a certain stability that is hardly ever to be found in fashion and its endless fluctuations. Accordingly, this stability that defines Freja seems to translate into her fanbase through a certain loyalty intrinsic to a lot of her followers. Perhaps you can chalk it up to hazard, but to me there's something more than coincidental about how most of her fans can't seem to stray away from her once they start answering to the name of Freja fan. It's a tacit give-and-take relation - she guarantees you constancy, you guarantee her lasting dedication.

I am fully aware that these last sentences might come across as out of the blue, but it seemed to me that they'd fit in with the rest of this article somehow. It isn't lost on me either that this post - its length and the topic it deals with - might be off-putting to some, but sometimes you just have to get your thoughts down and write for yourself, don't you?

source : scanned by ZFashionBlog @ tFS

Néo.

June July 1988 - October 1989 - August 1992

Christmas... What a fantastic excuse to slacken off and float through the consumerist craze that has come to define this celebration (unless, of course, you prefer using your common sense rather than mindlessly throwing your money about just for the sake of being obedient to the diktats society has set). All bitterness aside, I could - at least - take advantage of the meaningless atmosphere of this all to get offered a couple fashion-related books I had been eyeing forever, among which Steven Meisel : Three Hundred and Seventeen and Counting, which pulls together all the covers the photographer has lensed for Vogue Italia from July/August 1988 up until April 2009. This book may seem too meager a mean to round up twenty one years' work (back when it was published) to some, but I personally apprehend it as an encyclopaedia not only recording Meisel's major body of work but also lifting everything it consists out of from undergoing the onslaught of time and neglect.

December 1992 - August 1993 - October 1996

The front cover is adorned with black capital letters superimposed over a plain, white bakground while the back cover provides us with a mild overview of Meisel's work ; mild, if right on :

[...] Meisel not only depicts fashion. He defines it and gives it cultural reasonance.

Way to 1) set the tone 2) sum up a two decades-long undertaking in a handful words 3) express why I admire this photographer better than I ever did. Meisel has seemingly been slagged off quite a lot recently, as well as Vogue Italia has been claimed to be going downhill. As a fan of both the photographer and publication standing in the midst of this all, you would expect me to react indignantly, but being a fan shouldn't preclude from being realistic, and fact of the matter is that I consider 2010 to be more of a down than an up for Franca Sozzani and what she's come out with.

March 1999

Nevertheless, this book helped me comprehend that the views on Steven Meisel I had been holding up until one day ago were actually incorrect. I used to think he had never been outdone because of his capability of singling out current phenomenons at the right moment and basing his photography on them, which is inaccurate. Not only does he master topical fashion photography but he also knows how to give birth to typical, though amazing, fashion photography. That is why he is unparalleled. He can swing back and forth from reality, irony or harshness to beauty, luxury and dream, and that's why I cannot pick on him for going from Water and Oil to Vision of Feminity as nonchalantly as possible. I think that's what every image-maker worthy of the name ought to be able to do : make the beauty that may not surround us on a daily basis more accessible, broaden the primary goal of fashion to more up-to-date of a function, get us to face up to reality, mock some of our current zeitgeists ; and sway between these styles in the blinking of an eye.

July 2000 - April 2002 - October 2002

However awe-inspiring and talented Steven Meisel is, here's to keeping in ming that talent is worth nothing when not left open the possibility of expressing itself and blossoming out. It is in collaboration with Franca Sozzani, editor in chief of Vogue Italia, that Meisel has churned out fashion-forward and life-inspired concepts every month since mid-1988, and thanks to her that his visionary skills got to reach their peaks of intelligence. I've always felt Franca was unfairly left out of the cuddle in terms of public recognition, as opposed to her peers Carine Roitfeld and Anna Wintour, who relentlessly get put up on a pedestal and crowned as fashion godesses. Of course I'm not trying to play down Anna and Carine's impact on fashion, the control they had/have had over their respective publication and what they have achieved as business women but unlike Franca, they can't purport to uphold fashion as a thoughtful art and can't take pride in setting creativity above selling clothes, that's why I can't help feeling resentful when realizing how poor the recognition the latter's gained outside (and even inside) the tight fashion-lovers crowd is.

July 2003 (Supplements) - November 2003

I'm sorry to harp on this as much as I do. In real life I would tend to say being under the radar is nothing worthy of getting worked up over, but it's fashion we're talking about, and the fashion industry is miles away from real life. It's a world within which you can set forth the reputation that precedes you as a favour to make your way up. The image you cast is nearly as important as what you do, while what you do, however brilliant it may be, guarantees you neither acknowledgement nor praise. This is the realm of fashion, and this isn't lost on me. Should I necessarily swallow it down without further protest notwithstanding? Don't blame me, complaining is just organic to human nature, and making your complaints heard rises up as a safe balance between utter apathy and attempting to actually change something - both being absolutely intolerable to mankind.

August 2005 - September 2008 - March 2010

source : lexposure.net ; kristenmcm.altervista.org ; scanned by iluvjeisa @ tFS ; scanned by Mojopin @ tFS ; scanned by Proximity @ tFS ; scanned by Diciassette (17) @ tFS ; vogue-italia.blogspot.com ; fashionmodeldirectory.com

Pagan Poetry.

First visual of the Balenciaga Spring Summer 2011 campaign to leak. You might recall how averse I felt to the condescingly gimmicky casting the brand tried to shove down our throats in the show, and I wasn't expecting something more demure from the ad campaign when Gisele got confirmed to star in it, to say the least. In the end it seems like Mr. Meisel and all the behind-the-scenes so-and-sos agreed to break my parti pris apart and make me learn my lesson - none should jump to conclusions without anything concrete to base their thoughts upon.

When piled next to each other, these shots get you to scratch your head at why on earth they ended up tied together and if you, as the beholder, are not leaving something out that could possibly help you grasp the meaning of such a correlation. I happen to think it actually begins to make sense once you move past the bewilderment caused by such a sight onto a different approach to the pictures as a whole. Of course it's tough to get a true sense of what point was trying to be made when only two images out of 8? 9? 10? have been released. I personally get a feeling of resistance and timelessness from the clothes within both pictures and reckon the ad is aiming at enhancing those particular properties of theirs throughout different sceneries.

On the first shot you can see - almost feel - clean pieces of clothing aswell as their well thought-out cut and pattern interacting with an immaculate surrounding ; then you lay eye on the second one, cluttered, hard to decipher, close to grotesque, and yet the clothes still get to pierce through as neat as ever, as if Balenciaga could assert itself as an unalterable high-end brand regardless what may happen around. Of course it's more of a personal interpretation than the actual concept (sorry if you were expecting me to solve the mystery and hand the explanation to you on a plate!), but there's no denying that the quality of the craftmanship that went into the creation of the clothes is brought out as a strong sales argument here.

As for Gisele, she is made barely recognizable with a random wig on, something I couldn't wrap my head around in the first place (I mean, why hiring Gisele-legendary-Bündchen and attempt to transform her into someone else with various ornaments?) but which I could figure out after a deeper look into these first pictures and the overall feel emanating from them. It's like getting Gisele's charisma and presence in front of the lens without Gisele stealing the focus from the fashion the campaign intends to bring out prior to having any artistic value whatsoever. All in all, the cunning minds behind the Gisele-not-looking-like-herself trick definitely outwitted most of other advertising-makers, who tend to get trapped into laying far too much emphasis on the celebrities/supermodels at hand and forget the goal they should actually strive toward and carry out - doing the clothing a favour, that is.

Finally - the Balenciaga origami. You actually owe this entire analysis to it, because it is what stirred up my curiosity and caused me to read a little deeper into the first pictures released. It is such a whimsical touch to the ad, let alone a spot-on one. It seems to me that it echoes back to what partly makes Balenciaga this cutting-edge of a label - namely the intricate, sharp and futuristic cuts - and sums up what the brand is all about in the most evocative way possible.

I am well-aware that it's time for me to put an end to my garrulity, but I'll just add that this is when feeling rushes of Balenciaga-related inspiration such as this one (and it's not the first one I've experienced) that I realize that I cannot not love this brand, despite leaping at the chance to rant about it whenever I can. However elitist and pretentious the shows may be, regardless the disappointment the collections have bred for a couple seasons (minus the last one), it remains too inspirational not to keep me under its spell.

source : wwd.com via Flashbang @ tFS

A Woman of a Singular Charm.

Vogue Paris March 2010 - Vogue Paris August 2010 - Vogue Nippon March 2006

I've been feeling dramatically nostalgic today and restlessly enclined to immerse myself in oldies dating back to the very beginning of my infatuation with fashion - 2006, that is. I'll hand it to you that tracking down models who were in the spotlight back then and sank into oblivion almost at once ; trying to dig up editorials who hadn't made their way into your digital archives up until now ; taking a look at stories that had slipped off your mind is not necessarily the most effective way to tear yourself away from nostalgia but then again, having a blast from the past every now and then has never been that harmful. It is actually most informative regarding fashion per se - because after all, when I started paying attention to it I was more of a dilettante than a hardcore follower and overlooked a plethora of things - and caused me to wonder why it grabbed ahold of me at this very moment ; what made me shift from monthly reading Vogue Paris so as to parade about to being genuinely interested in fashion.

Vogue Italia September 2006 - Vogue Italia August 2006 - Vogue Italia December 2010

Among the things that had a strong hand in my introduction to this illusional fantasy (no, Kate Moss and Karl Lagerfeld are nowhere to be found within my list, ha.)? Norwegian mystery Iselin Steiro. Iselin's career pattern is pretty much impeccable, and so is she as a model - the kind of model you can both relate to and look up to - mysteriously laid-back ; different-looking without overshadowing the clothes she displays ; deceptively chameleon-esque, on top of all. At the risk of being repetitive (and I know I already am), versatility should go hand in hand with modelling.

Vogue UK October 2010 - S Magazine #10 - Vogue Paris April 2007

Versatility draws the beholders into questioning their identifying skills ; it takes by surprise and spices the things up ; finally it enables to weed out the models who won't be able to go the distance from the ones who will be. It is no secret that models often tend to get pigeonholed into tight categories and the ones set up for longevity and success are positively those who manage to transcend the barriers we want to shut them in. And that's what Iselin has achieved all throughout her seven years-long career, playing off of her various facets and taking on a different appearance from a story to another... No wonder why she and Freja Beha Erichsen have been paired up so many times and have worked wonders as many times.

Vogue Paris May 2006 - Flair June 2005 - Vogue UK August 2005

source : click through the link under the images.