Profile for NYMag.com's The Cut

Model Natalia Vodianova: “It’s Better To Be Skinny Than To Be Fat”

NYMag.com's The CutApril 23, 2012 //

Natalia Vodianova took part in a panel discussion at the British Vogue Festival over the weekend, where she made some ballsy statements about women and weight. The comments were sparked by British Vogue‘s executive fashion director Calgary Avansino’s question: “It’s undeniable that models are very thin, expected to be very thin, and thinner than 99.9 percent of the population. What message should you be sending out?” Vodianova didn’t hold back; see what she had to say about her diet, losing weight after childbirth, and how she trains (or doesn’t) before running a marathon each year. Read more…

Bald Dudes Have It Easier These Days, According To The NY Times

NYMag.com's The CutApril 19, 2012 //

Until scientists find an actual “cure” for baldness, dudes must choose from the following options: (a) ignoring it, (b) fighting it with hair plugs, weird creams, toupees, etc., or (c) just shaving their heads completely. A piece in today’s Times endorses the latter approach enthusiastically:

Shaving your balding head is like breaking up with someone before he or she can break up with you. Or like marching into your boss’s office and saying: “You can’t fire me. I quit.”

So, you men with thinning hairlines, seize your future! Or rather, seize your razor, march into the shower, and lather up! Don’t waste any time, because you’ve apparently got a lot of shopping and possibly some working out to do, too. Read more…

Pippa And The Gun: The Middletons’ Very First Scandal

NYMag.com's The CutApril 17, 2012 //
Pippa Middleton photo

Pippa Middleton was just having a nice, normal weekend in Paris when she popped by a fancy costume party for fashion label owner Arthur de Soultrait (yes, the Daily Mail has pictures of her silly outfit) and then tootled around in an Audi convertible with three handsome gentlemen on Sunday. But then the driver of her car pulled out a gun (whether it’s real remains unknown) and pointed it at one of the paparazzi trailing behind them, much to the amusement of Pippa and their fellow passengers. Et voilà! The first major Middleton scandal was born. Read more…

Katy Perry & Baptiste Giabiconi Are Definitely 2012’s Best New Rumored Couple (So Far)

NYMag.com's The CutMarch 10, 2012 //

Thanks to a recent post on gossip blog Celebzter, “Page Six” reports that Katy Perry and male model Baptiste Giabiconi are dating. Fate masquerading as a savvy PR assistant placed them next to each other at this season’s Chanel show, where they presumably found enough time away from staring at the pretty clothes (and their own reflections in the set’s reflective crystal stalagmites) to fall truly, madly, deeply in love. They held hands at a post-show dinner, and Baptiste reportedly bought her some flowers — though you’d think as a longtime Chanel muse that he could have sprung for some shoes or something. They were all ready for a “romantic date” too, presumably chaperoned by Karl himself, but then thePlace Vendôme caught on fire. What bad luck! Read more…

‘Mantyhose’ Is Happening!

NYMag.com's The CutMarch 6, 2012 //

Apparently some dudes are into wearing fancy tights these days, according to upscale hosiery retailer Emilio Cavallini, who tellsWWD that purchases by men (and for men) now account for 2 to 3 percent of their annual sales. He noticed the trend about three years ago:

When we started our online shop we noticed that a lot of tights sized medium-large were being purchased by men … So I did a search on the Internet and discovered there is a cult following for mantyhose.

So he decided to cater to male customers by creating unisex tights that allow for greater breathability, “which is important since men perspire much more than women do.” Sexy! Read more…

The Meryl Streep Look Book

NYMag.com's The CutMarch 3, 2012 //

There’s no question that Meryl Streep has displayed incredible consistency as a powerhouse actress — this Sunday will mark her seventeenth Academy Award nomination — but style-wise, she’s been a bit all over the map. To her credit, the occasional misstep has only made the journey all that much more fun (who wants to see another overly styled celebot?), and the woman simply radiates self-confidence and a certain kind of glamour that has just the right amount of humor. Here, a pre-Oscar present: 100 photos of Streep in all her shining blonde glory. Click through for eighties-era metallic suits that would make Prabal proud, a suntanned Streep riding the New York City subway, and movie stills of the actress alongside her many leading men. Who else’s hair could Robert Redford have washed stream-side in Out of Africa? No one’s. Read more…

Wet ‘N’ Wild Went And Got Itself A Celebrity Spokesperson

NYMag.com's The CutFebruary 11, 2012 //

Wet ‘n’ Wild, a cosmetics company that’s surely suffering in the digital age from the un-Googleability of its name (don’t try it for yourself unless you are 1) alone, and 2) actually looking for, um, a water theme park), has finally thrown in the towel and hired their very first celebrity spokesperson. Which is the end of an era, really — amid all the constant face changeover in drugstore cosmetics aisles (Kate Hudson! Christy Turlington! Jessica White!), that pink-lipped, scrunchie-wearing Wet ‘n’ Wild girl always remained a comforting standby. Now she’ll be replaced by Fergie, who says she signed on with the brand because it was popular in Hacienda Heights, the L.A. neighborhood where she grew up. Read more…

Blake Lively Hopes Her Sons Are “Trannies”

NYMag.com's The CutFebruary 5, 2012 //

Blake Lively’s March Elle cover is decidedly one of those “typical” ones — note the solid background and “traditional hand-on-hip pose” — that Glamour is now so decisively against. But regardless, the accompanying interview contains some gems of awkwardness, like her thoughts on motherhood: “I hope to have a few girls one day. If not girls, they better be trannies. Because I have some amazing shoes and bags and stories that need to be appreciated.” Read more…

Controversy Over French Elle’s “Black Style” Article Drags On

NYMag.com's The CutFebruary 2, 2012 //

After running a wholly inappropriate article on “black style” last month, editors at French Elle removed the piece without comment. They later blandly acknowledged the backlash it received with the excuse that the story was misunderstood. Speaking over the weekend, Elle‘s managing editor Valerie Toranian said it was “full of good intentions” that were just expressed badly, which only ignited a new round of outrage over the story, and how the magazine handled the subsequent backlash. 

A group of 35 famous French citizens sent an open letter to Le Monde dissecting the offending article’s many flaws. The letter’s authors — journalists, TV and film critics, and model Noémie Lenoir among them — also urged Elle‘s editorial staffers to “[venture] out of their office windows in the business district of Levallois-Perret to mingle with the population — allowing them to see what black people [actually] look like, and how they dress in real life.” Read more…

Video: An Homage To McQueen In “RuPaul’s Drag Race” Premiere?

NYMag.com's The CutFebruary 1, 2012 //

The fourth season of the wonderful “RuPaul’s Drag Race” premiered last night on Logo; the show’s thirteen new drag-queen contestants had to survive the “Rupocalypse,” the series’ first elimination. This Rupocalypse involved a challenging photo session with perennial reality-TV “star” Mike Ruiz, in which the queens had to pose on a spinning platform while being hosed down with “toxic waste” (read: neon-colored paint) by two near-naked male models. This might not seem like textbook McQueen, but the queens’ slow, off-kilter spin cycles in voluminous white dresses seemed very reminiscent of the iconic spring 1999 McQueen show’s finale, with model Shalom Harlow getting graffitied by two menacing robots. The challenge was in keeping with drag queens’ reputation for reappropriating fashion imagery in the best possible way, and not only because a good queen never misses the opportunity to make a phallic joke about hoses.

Watch a video of paint-covered queens falling all over themselves here…

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