- Chrissy Teigen shared a series of throwback photos from her swimsuit modeling days on Instagram.
- Teigen reflected on the slightly unglamorous reality of Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Miami.
- "Dinner with randos at Prime 112, ordering enough food to take home to eat for the week cause the fashion show money would disappear with agency fees," she wrote. "Sleeping in a two bedroom at the Flamingo with 5 other girls, MEMORIES!"
Before the bestselling cookbooks, the TV shows, and the Twitter account approved by the president (opens in new tab), Chrissy Teigen was a swimsuit model, a career which saw her walk the runway at Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Miami. On Instagram Sunday, she shared a series of throwback fashion week photos (including the one above, from 2010), and reflected on the unglamorous reality of her modeling days.
"was talking about my days of Miami fashion week and how it was basically my equivalent of walking Paris couture," Teigen captioned the post, which you can see here (opens in new tab). "200 bucks a show minus agency and I’d wait 5/6 hours sitting on the floor of the Mondrian to be seen."
"Booking a show at the Setai, walking over the pool, oh my god the excitement, C-class Naomi Campbell coming throughhhhhh!!!!!!" Teigen continued. "Dinner with randos at Prime 112, ordering enough food to take home to eat for the week cause the fashion show money would disappear with agency fees. Sleeping in a two bedroom at the Flamingo with 5 other girls, MEMORIES!"
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Speaking to Glamour UK (opens in new tab) last year, Teigen opened up about the toll her career as a swimsuit model took on her self-esteem, revealing she'd been fired from three modeling jobs after being measured on set. "That was my entire career, doing weigh-ins. With model agencies, it was normal to get measured too, and I did it myself mainly, so when you had direct bookings without castings, [the clients] knew what they were getting. There were jobs I would turn up to and they would say my measurements were off and it was the worst feeling to be kicked off the job."
Teigen reflected on one particularly upsetting incident: "The client had booked me directly. I had half my make-up done and they asked me to get up and take a few photos, to test the light. But they sent [the pictures] to my agency and the client fired me on the spot. I didn’t do any jobs without first going to a casting meeting for years after that."
Ending her modeling career, Teigen said, helped her to be kinder to her body. "I used to weigh myself every morning, afternoon and night. I knew what the scales would say after each meal. I did that for eight years and had this one weight I wanted to be at," she told the magazine. "That changed with Luna, and really changed with Miles [her son, two], where it took me a year to be comfortable with my new normal number.
“I do look at [my body] in the shower and think, 'Arghhh, these kids,'" she continued. But I don’t take the aesthetics so seriously now. It’s very fulfilling not having that pressure of putting on a swimsuit and looking good for a magazine while running around a beach, which I did when I was modeling. I don’t feel like my body is where I’m going to be shitty to myself, either. I’m already thinking enough things I am mad at myself about, I can’t add my body into it."
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Emily Dixon is a British journalist who’s contributed to CNN, Teen Vogue, Time, Glamour, The Guardian, Wonderland, The Big Roundtable, Bust, and more, on everything from mental health to fashion to political activism to feminist zine collectives. She’s also a committed Beyoncé, Kacey Musgraves, and Tracee Ellis Ross fan, an enthusiastic but terrible ballet dancer, and a proud Geordie lass.
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