Leslie Hornby Essays - Twiggy, Model, Waif, Kate Moss, Vogue, W

Leslie Hornby At 17 Leslie Hornby took hold of the world. At 21 she let it go, she was the original waif, a 60's phenomenon a superstar. She was "Twiggy" (Vogue). Leslie Hornby was the revolutionary woman who changed the idea of beauty in the eyes of the fashion industry and the entire world. Twiggy exemplified the androgynous mod look that swept America as it had Britain and much of Europe in the 1960's. She healthily maintained a 5 ft 6 1/2 inch 90 lb body. Based on her thin figure, a nickname of "Twiggy" was derived. Twiggy's popularity not only produced many people who tried to look like her but also drastically increased the hourly wages of models. She paved the way for current top models like Kate Moss, Elle MacPherson, and Linda Evangelista. Twiggy was major trendsetter in America during the sixties even though she was born in England. She was found by Nigel Davies in a salon, while working as a shampoo girl. He saw her potential and immediately took her to get a haircut at a Mr. Leonard's trendy salon in London. Mr. Leonard put her picture in his shop window, and a short time later that picture was featured in the London Daily Express with a caption that read "This is the face of 1966" (Wilson). Davies, who preferred to be called Justin De Villeneuve, was quite an interesting character with his past resume containing ex-model, ex-antique dealer, and ex-hairdresser. After he discovered her, he (age 25) became Twiggy's (age 15) agent and boyfriend. He took her to Paris and a short while after her popularity grew, she was put on the cover of Elle Magazine, as well as Paris Match and the British edition of Vogue. During Twiggy's peak success in Europe, De Villeneuve set up Twiggy Enterprises Ltd. where he gathered a line of clothes, false eyelashes, cosmetics, dolls, and posters all endorsed by Twiggy. The business brought in millions. Since Twiggy was so young, Justin ran the entire business. She only had to agree to what she liked and put her name on it. The thought of a Model taking advantage of her success to start an enterprise was completely revolutionary. Once again Twiggy paved the way for models like Cindy Crawford, Claudia Schiffer, Kate Moss, and Naomi Campbell all of which opened highly successful restaurants, and made exercise tapes, clothes, calendars, posters, and many other products. The enterprising aspect of being a top model was started by Twiggy and that influence is commonly seen in the business world today. Twiggy's next step in her career was to travel to the United States. Twiggy's success soared when she made her first visit to America. On March 20,1967 the second she stepped off the plane she was swarmed by fans, and was candy to the media's eyes. She was like a fever that spread. Everyone wanted a piece of her. Her pictures were everywhere. Twiggy's popularity allowed her to charge revolutionary high prices an hour. She charged as much as $240 an hour opposed to a 50's top model like Suzy Parker who only received about $40 an hour (Century of Models). Once again Twiggy set the standard for 90's top models to earn outrageous sums of money. For example, the 90's Twiggy (Kate Moss) earns about 26.3 million dollars a year. One reason for Twiggy's great success was that the public had never seen anyone like her. She had a completely new look that took the entire world by surprise. During the 40's, long limbed, and sophisticated was the trend. In the 50's, a more curvaceous womanly look (Marilyn Monroe) was in. Twiggy set the 60's waiflike standard. What a leap from Marilyn to Twiggy. They were almost completely opposite. Twiggy's influence is still seen on today's runways and television. The current day Twiggy is Kate Moss. Her figure is strikingly similar (Twiggy 31-22-32, Moss 33-22-35) (Century of Models). Remarkably, Twiggy's favorite thing to eat was ice cream, bananas and hot fudge, she doesn't drink or smoke but "eats like a horse" (Time). Twiggy is one of those girls who has an extremely high metabolism and is healthy but just cannot gain weight. As a child, her mother was very worried about Leslie's thinness and took her to see many doctors. The doctors concluded that the thinness was just a result of her body type and couldn't be helped. When asked what she thought of her figure as "the thing of the future" she replied "it's not really what you