London - Top models are so desperate to stay ‘Paris thin’ they starve themselves and eat tissues to help fill their empty stomachs, a former Vogue editor has revealed.
Kirstie Clements, who edited the magazine’s Australian edition until last year, said models use hospital drips to avoid eating solid food.
Clements was sensationally fired from her role as editor of Australian Vogue last May.
The book claims some models resort to breast reduction surgery to appear thinner if dieting hasn’t had the desired effect on their physique.
The drastic measures are revealed in Clements’ new book The Vogue Factor, which lifts the lid on the secrets of the weight-obsessed fashion industry.
In the book, she describes how an unnamed Russian model confided that her flatmate was a “fit” model “so she is in hospital on a drip a lot of the time” to stay thin.
Top designers design their clothing collections around the body of a fit model – hence the need to maintain a constant weight.
Describing the attitude in her own office, Clements wrote: “When a model who was getting good work in Australia starved herself down two sizes in order to be cast in the overseas shows... the Vogue fashion office would say she’d become ‘Paris thin’.”
In another example of extreme dieting, she describes the case of a top model who didn’t eat a single meal on a three-day fashion shoot in Morocco. On the last day, she writes, the woman could only just hold herself upright and keep her eyes open because she was so listless with hunger.
It’s not the first tell-all book to reveal the less than glamorous world of fashion models.
In Fashion Babylon, British writer Imogen Edward-Jones told how models used laxatives and diet pills to keep their stick-thin figures.
And former Vogue cover girl Amy Lemons said in a 2010 documentary that she witnessed models eating cotton balls dipped in juice to curb their hunger.
Doctors say eating paper can cause serious intestinal problems such as pain, bloating and even blockages and ruptures, as well as depriving the body of vital nutrients.
Last year, 19 Vogue editors from around the world, including Clements, signed The Health Initiative, a pledge not to work with models who appear to be unhealthy or who are under the age of 16.
The pledge called for healthier working conditions backstage, including the availability of healthy food for models.
The editors also vowed to encourage designers to stop producing unrealistically small sample sizes limiting the range of women who can model their clothes.
* Clements spent 25 years at Australian Vogue - her book's subhead is 'from front desk to editor' - and steered the ship for 13 of them.
Her departure was sudden - she was called to a meeting and dismissed, forced to clean her office and leave without bidding farewell to her staff - and she was replaced quickly by Edwina McCann, editor of Harper's Bazaar.
Clements describes her sacking simply as a 'regime change' that was part and parcel of the dramatic Vogue narrative, but some critics believe the new book - her first - is her way of exacting revenge on the Rupert Murdoch-owned title. - Daily Mail