Page 23 - Waterfall Issue 9_2022

Fashion Week (SAFW) director Lucilla and significant career-developing
Booyzen says that top models have opportunity to do a campaign with
an ‘it’ factor that allows the camera top international brand, Puma.
or the runway to access a unique
spiritedness that lights up the world. New Talents Glowing and
Growing
“It is a quality that can make a brand Since its inception in 2019, the
come alive or inspire a designer’s competition that drew 600 online
creative vision. It is an inner vitality entries in 2021, has catapulted
that is much more compelling remarkable new talents onto the
than physical good looks.” local and international scene.

This can easily be a departure from “Models are key when it comes to the
the conventional beauty ideal – a marketing of fashion. Without models,
gap between the front teeth that there would be no shows, fashion
gives a goofy loveliness, such as spreads, media coverage and none
with Dutch model Lara Stone, or of the exceptional social media buzz
the distinctive birthmark of local generated about the new designer
favourite Kgothi Iman that adds depth collections,” explains Booyzen.
of character to the simplest shot.
Inaugural winners Trystan Riley and
True Grit Lethabo Khunou of Boss Models
Superficially, a modelling career may Image above by Eunice Driver Photography have been a powerful addition to
supplied by SA Fashion Week | Official SA Fashion
seem as simple as pitching up, but Week Runway Photographer | Collection by Ntando the agency’s board and have grown
the truth is that every successful XV SS22 immensely as models over the past two
model has a gritty staying power that Image below by Eunice Driver Photography years, despite the hurdles caused by
enables them to face setbacks and supplied by SA Fashion Week | Official SA Fashion the pandemic, says booker Erin Heart.
hardships with the same elegance Week Runway Photographer | Collection by Artho
Eksteen AW23
that carries them down the runway. Trystan’s striking Titian bob and delicately
freckled skin has added a delightful
“Demand for the discipline and quirkiness to television commercials for
professionalism of South African multiple local brands including, KFC,
models puts them in the top Samsung and Share Now as well as on
three countries with Sweden and the international fashion front for Europa
Canada internationally,” says Jane Art’s SS21 campaign and top hair stylist
Celliers, director of Ice Models. “In Candice McKay’s international multi-
addition to being gorgeous, they award-winning hair collection, The Lotus.
are exceptionally industrious and
dependable and simply great to have Lethabo, too, has shone brightly
on a team because of their easy-going in her time at Boss. She became a
attitudes and ability to roll with the muse to several SAFW designers,
inherent challenges of the industry.” recently flew out to Tanzania to shoot
luxury Danish brand Munthe’s Pre-
Local model Nicole Bux for example, Fall 2022 collection and landed the
endured a bleak and cold English opportunity to star with Viola Davis in
Christmas without any family, in an upcoming movie, The Woman King.
order to secure a working visa for
the UK when international travel to The competition was placed on
South Africa was prohibited after hold for 2020 during the pandemic
the discovery of the Omicron COVID but resumed in 2021, partnering
strain. Her courage to tough it out has with Ice Models in a rotational
subsequently landed her a lucrative structure that alternates annually

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