Evangelista shares her tips for timeless good looks
Supermodel Evangelista on social media, aging and the skin-care product she swears by
Sitting on a plush sofa in the personal shopping suite in Holt Renfrew Vancouver with Linda Evangelista — yes, the Canadian supermodel who was part of “The Trinity” in the 1990s alongside Christy Turlington and Naomi Campbell — my phone is ringing. And I’m mortified.
It’s my sister, trying to FaceTime me from her holiday.
“I’m so sorry,” I say to Evangelista, declining the call and mentally kicking myself for not turning on the Do Not Disturb option on my phone before my interview with the St. Catharines, Ont.-born model.
This is, after all, a woman who has famously been misquoted as saying she doesn’t get out of bed for less than $10,000 per day. (The actual quote to Vogue magazine in October 1990 was, “We have this saying, Christy and I ... we don’t wake up for less than $10,000 a day,” and it was reportedly taken out of context.) A woman who has been called a “goddess” by the likes of Tim Blanks, the editor-atlarge at The Business of Fashion. A woman who has been on the cover of more than 700 magazines, including French, Italian and American Vogue, and walked in fashion shows for Chanel, Versace, Ralph Lauren and Valentino.
But Evangelista’s response is anything but diva behaviour.
“Answer it!” she exclaims enthusiastically. “Let’s FaceTime her!”
And, just like that, my discomfort at my phone faux pas was gone. Evangelista easily resumes talking freely about everything from her past endorsements and her adorable French bulldog, Mini Moon, to the idea of aging — not to mention, the contrasting opinions people have of her appearance as she grows older.
“If you don’t look like you did when you’re young, it’s not good. And, if you try to do something, people say, ‘Oh look, she’s trying to look young,’ ” she says. “You just can’t win.”
Evangelista admits she learned the hard way about this anti antiaging view when she first began posting on her social media channels, including on her Instagram account @lindaevangelista. While she has long been reluctant to share too much of her personal life with the public — she was curious about sharing select snapshots with her fans.
“The few times, in the beginning, that I posted a natural picture of me with no makeup, the comments were like, ‘Oh my God, is she sick?’ ” she recalls with a laugh. “They expect you to look like your Italian Vogue pictures — I don’t look like my Italian Vogue pictures. That’s like, four hours of hair and makeup later.
“So, when you give them the real, they don’t really want that — not from me,” she continues. “Everybody else is so transparent, and it’s refreshing. I give it to them and they’re like, ‘Oh my God!’ ”
The feedback, as well as her own growing distrust of the “reality” she sees shared online, ultimately skewed her opinion of the platforms.
“Social media has ruined everything. Absolutely everything. I don’t even know what the truth is, or what reality is. It’s all messed up,” she says.
When asked to expand on this idea of the “altered” — not to mention filtered — reality we all experience through the veils of social media, Evangelista spoke about her concerns, and also the impact on her own perceptions.
“I feel like everybody has such a better life, because it looks so fabulous on Instagram and Facebook,” she says.
But, it’s not all bad. Evangelista admits she got a kick out of rapper Cardi B’s nod to her iconic Chanel chain-bedecked look earlier this year.
“That was a moment,” she says with a laugh. “My nephew sent it to me, he was like, ‘Auntie Linda, look-it!’ I felt really cool.”
These days, Evangelista sticks closer to sharing shots of her precious pup, random things that inspire her, the rare snapshot of her son, Augustin James Evangelista — and yes, throwbacks from her fashion days and a selfie or two.
But, she’s not interested in winning the social media game if it requires living in the past through a series of #ThrowbackThursday posts. And she’s not interested in turning back time either. She simply has too much to look forward to for that.
“I’m so pro-aging,” she says. “Having a child made me want to get old. I really want to be around for everything that’s to come in my family.”
That doesn’t mean she’s interested in embracing all the signs of aging though.
“I would like to look good along the way,” she says. “And if there are a molecule or two that can help us along the way, which there are, I’m for it.”
So, what’s Evangelista’s take on the current trend of embracing all types of tinctures and forms of procedures aimed at making one look and feel younger?
“I am pro Botox, pro filler, pro laser — pro everything,” she says. “If that’s what you want.”
At 53, Evangelista says she’s finally found her preferred potion for making her feel good in her own skin. That product is Erasa. In fact, it was the product that brought her to Vancouver (for the first time, I might add) in her role as creative director for the New York-based skin care brand.
It’s a role she didn’t take on without careful consideration, as she admits she promoted a few products in the past that she didn’t fully believe in.
“I’ve represented products that I’ve never tried. Products that I didn’t believe in,” she says, candidly. “I’ve done interviews where the journalist — we both knew. She was there because they advertised and I was there because I was paid to be there.
“It’s so refreshing to actually love what I’m spreading the news on and creating. It’s different. I know that it works, so it’s not BS.”
In fact, Evangelista was first introduced to the product through the husband of a friend. Curious about why he would be recommending a skin care product, Evangelista says she tried the pinkbottled potion. And she hasn’t stopped using it since.
“I had such a huge beauty routine. I had a protocol,” she says of her prior regime. “My brother put up two more shelves for me. I had them all lined up and numbered and had a little printout frame.”
So, just how many products is she talking about?
“Twenty-six,” she says. “There was a lineup. Not all of them at once, but there was a rotation.” Twenty-six products? Really? “I never did it,” she scoffs with a small smirk at the awe-inspiring assemblage. “But I’m ambitious. And I love beauty products. But I would shower and brush my teeth and then look at them and think, f--k it, I’m not doing this.”
Foregoing the lineup of tinctures, Evangelista admits she’d often head straight to bed instead. And that’s where she finally fell for Erasa.
“I had the bottle of Erasa beside my bed,” she recalls. “And I always wear lip balm, hand cream and have two humidifiers, because it’s so dry. And I was like, ‘Oh, let me tryit.’”
After a few weeks of use, Evangelista noticed a difference.
“I was tweezing my brows in the magnifying mirror,” she says. “And I noticed that something was going on.”
Evangelista says she ran around to the windows in her New York apartment, checking to see the results of the product on her skin in the natural light. Finally believing what she was seeing, she decided to become more dedicated to her Erasa skin care regime.
“I started doubling down, using it at morning and night,” she says. “And by the fourth week, then I knew. I was so skeptical — but my melasma had faded and my pores were smaller. I wasn’t looking at the wrinkles because, I don’t know ... I don’t care about wrinkles. I like wrinkles.”
Everything was going smoothly, that is, until she ran out.
“I wasn’t even aware that I had finished my bottle,” she says. “I thought it was blocked, so, I was banging it on the counter and running it under hot water. And then I figured out that I’d finished it. And I thought, ‘What? I’ve never finished a product in my life.’ ”
Happy with the results she experienced, Evangelista decided to reach out to the Erasa team directly. And now, Evangelista’s skin care regime has been edited down from 26 to one.
With her feet firmly planted in the beauty world at the moment, and our interview coming to a close, I had one final question that lingered in my mind: will Linda Evangelista ever return to fashion?
“I don’t have my crystal ball,” she says with a smile. “But I will come back to fashion. I will. I’m not done with fashion — I’m not done.
“I’m just having a timeout.”
They expect you to look like your Italian Vogue pictures — I don’t look like my Italian Vogue pictures.