I will be completely honest and upfront about the modeling industry as I understand it, and you can decide how this applies to your situation yourself. As I’ve learned here in Hollywood, the best teachers (like my acting teacher) are unflinchingly direct about the requirements of the business, because once we’re out there trying to get work, we can count on no mercy from the people who are hiring and firing.

* There will always be exceptions to the information below (“I know of this one model who started at 30 and had no teeth and she’s famous today…” etc) but by and large this is the way it works:

* Fashion businesspeople hire models for one reason: to sell their product. It is all about dollars and cents, and they are simply not going to pay someone $10,000 for ten hours of work unless that person is not only physically beyond perfect, but also vivacious and spirited and talented at displaying the product for the camera.

* Most models start around age 14. By the early 20′s they are all washed up and had better hope they made enough high level friends and connections to slide into television hosting work, soap operas or some other business. Of course there are models in their 30′s working right now (Tyra Banks, etc) but they started when they were very young and have established themselves with not only their looks, but a smart business sense to keep themselves useful and relevant to the industry in other ways once their age starts to show.

* Most models are 5’10 and up and a perfect size 4 or smaller (I am 5’10 and a size 8-10, way too fat to model, just to give perspective). Runway samples (the version of a piece of clothing made to be shown on the runway before the full collection is taken to production) are usually made in size 4, and if someone can’t fit that, then they can’t work. Especially for a new model just breaking in, there can be no visible cellulite or other figure issues.

* There are at least three professional models in my acting class, and if you have never been in the room with a real model, they are the kind of people who are monumentally striking, breathtaking and fascinating no matter what they’re doing or wearing. Top models are that memorable woman who stood out in a room of 300 party guests, that girl in highschool who stopped the room when she came to class, that girl who came into the office that one time five years ago for two minutes and people still talk about it—all those women rolled into one. It’s not enough to just be pretty, or even beautiful. To be a successful model, a person has to project personality and be hypnotically fascinating to such a degree that even when it’s watered down to 1% in a 5″ tall photograph, her face and eyes and body will make someone stop flipping pages and look at what she’s wearing/using/doing. In person, the models I’ve met are remarkably, arrestingly attractive in surprising and unique ways from every angle I’ve seen them, and they were only really midlevel models—I’ve never met a top model like Giselle B. or Linda E.

* I don’t say all this to discourage anyone, but trust me, I work in the entertainment industry myself and hang out with models on a weekly basis, and it is a totally unfair, cutthroat and difficult business. If you can get the work, though, it is crazy fun and lucrative. But then again, the people who get work as real models have been beautiful or interesting looking their whole lives, so they’re somewhat used to the world falling at their feet anyway.

* There are easier levels of modeling, like for local catalogs (print), local in-store promotion (like I did for MAC several times in Chicago), doing runway for local designers/friends, etc. Especially for catalog modeling, one can be most any age or height, but one still must be attractive. To get started in this, get some high-quality professional headshots and/or a zed card made (a good photographer will know what that is), maybe take a class or two on modeling or photography, and start submitting to local agencies.

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