Fashion industry drove her into anorexia, says former model
Victoire Dauxerre was not planning to become a runway model. When she was scouted at age 17 while window shopping in her hometown of Paris, she turned down the offer — she was planning to go to university to study political science.
But when she didn't get into her school of choice, the offer of a year in the fashion world became more tempting.
"They tell you you're going to move to New York, you're going to earn money doing nothing. Basically, you just have to pose and be on photos," Dauxerre tells The Current's Anna Maria Tremonti.
Less than a year later, Dauxerre was in hospital being treated for anorexia.
From the first meeting with her modelling agency, Dauxerre — who was 5'10" and 123 pounds at the time — was told she was too big to fit into the runway clothes.
"They basically told me, around your hips you are 90 cm," says Dauxerre. "You have to be 87. And we are going to write it in your contract, which you have to sign. So it was done."
She ate only three apples a day for two months — adding laxatives and enemas if her weight crept up — and lost 23 pounds.
"So you have to be sick," Dauxerre says.
"You can't be healthy being so tall and so skinny. It is not possible."
Dauxerre writes in her book, Size Zero: My Life As A Disappearing Model, photos were retouched to make models look heavier.
"You have to be a skeleton for the fashion show ... so each model looks exactly the same as the other. But then for the photo shoots they obviously have to make some changes because you can't sell something if you see all the bones of the girls," she tells Tremonti.
Working outside in wintertime Paris, wearing only lingerie, Dauxerre waited for a famous photographer to set up his camera. When she got too cold, she said she would wait in the car until he was ready. The photographer called her agency to complain about her behaviour.
"My agent called me back saying, who do you think you are, you only are a model," says Dauxerre.
"And this sentence actually made me stop. I thought, no I'm not only a model … I can study. I have dreams."
When Dauxerre left modelling at 19, she had "the skeleton of a 70-year-old woman." Now six years later, Dauxerre is still recovering from her eating disorder — and working as an actress.
Her message she wants young girls — and their parents — to know is looking like a model is not a goal in life.
"It's not the secret to be happy … I've been through this and I have never been so unhappy in my life."
Listen to the full conversation at the top of the web post.
This segment was produced by The Current's Karin Marley.