Backstage with the Angels
Behind the scenes at the latest Victoria’s Secret fashion show, Bryony Gordon finds hard work, girliness, and a lot of fun
OF ALL the many looks that came down the runway at the annual Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show last week, my favourite had to be Alpine Angel. There had been Police Angel (coat barely able to contain lace-covered bosom), Space Angel (silver leotard barely able to contain bosom) and Business Angel (braces and unbuttoned shirt barely able to contain… you get the picture). But Alpine Angel… well, she was truly special.
Alpine Angel, played by the British supermodel Lily Donaldson, wore a white lacy bra and knickers with matching suspender belt, while all around her pretend snowflakes fell and Christmas trees dangled from the ceiling.
Thankfully, Alpine Angel had prepared for the cold by accessorising with a pair of giant fluffy gloves and some earmuffs, not forgetting some practical, six-inch heeled snow booties.
Another Alpine Angel, this one the leggy Candice Swanepoel, was wearing a glittering body stocking that had been slashed to the navel to reveal a snow-white bra, her ample décolletage draped in diamonds.
Welcome to the 20th Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show, where it is important that you suspend your stockings and your sense of belief at the door.
Just in case you have lived under a rock and are not quite sure what Victoria’s Secret is, let me fill you in.
It is a mega-lingerie brand – America’s largest – that last year turned over £4.7-billion (R101.7-billion) from the sales of bras, knickers and topdrawer whatnots. Its annual fashion show (or should that be fashion performance?) is created by Emmy and Bafta winners, and in it the models are required to wear wings (hence they are dubbed Angels).
Part catwalk show, part rock concert – last year’s show was watched by 9.29-million viewers in America alone (500-million worldwide) – it is at the centre of the brand’s marketing.
You may not be able to locate your nearest Victoria’s Secret store (there is a store at Sandton City in Johannesburg), but you will no doubt have heard of a few Victoria’s Secret Angels – Gisele, Heidi Klum, Tyra Banks, Miranda Kerr, to name but a few who have earned their “wings” from the brand.
The show naturally has its critics, who argue that it is objectifying and little more than an exercise in titillation – a notion that is rejected outright by Ed Razek, the company’s chief marketing officer and the man who handpicks each of the models for the show.
“Men don’t put a pork chop on our plate,” he says bluntly, when I meet him backstage. “Our customer base is 98% women and those women need to be able to relate to that girl.”
Of course, one might argue that there is little relatable about any of the women in this cavernous pink room, who between them have 88-million Instagram followers and have put in several thousand hours of gym work. There are 47 models here, all with eyes like Disney princesses, lips like Playboy centrefolds and the bodies of Olympic athletes.
They wear bras, “panties” and silk, buttock-skimming dressing gowns teamed with pink flip-flops, their smartphones permanently in hand for the obligatory Instagram selfies (as if these girls weren’t photographed enough, they must also take an endless stream for social media).
The models, who include Adriana Lima, Alessandra Ambrosio and Gigi Hadid, will spend all day in hair and make-up, surrounded by battalions of men and women brandishing lip gloss and hair extensions. They look surprisingly natural at the end of it all.
Except they’re not, of course. They are almost superhuman, blessed with lucky genes and dazzling, pearly white smiles. People spend big bucks to come to the show and see these goddesses – it is said that tickets can change hands for upwards of £10 000 – and an appearance on the runway is so coveted that Victoria’s Secret executives are routinely offered hundreds of thousands by billionaires desperate to secure slots for their model girlfriends.
But you cannot buy your way on to the Victoria’s Secret catwalk any more than you can buy your way into the England football squad. You have to juice and gym your way here, and develop a love of egg whites.
“You know, these girls are one in 500,” says Razek, referring to the number from which they are whittled down. “They are at the very top of their game.”
He doesn’t like the fact that models are often looked down on, even if they do happen to be taller than us.
“These are physically gifted people, like athletes. They have to be graceful while walking in heels this high.” He mimes high. “We land in New York and go to bed. They land and they have to look good all day long. I am a huge fan of these young women and the discipline they show to get here. These are physically fit, alive young women. They aren’t just thin mannequins.”
Razek tells me about a successful model who came to a casting one year but did not make the cut. “She wanted to know why. I said: ‘I follow you on Instagram. And every night you are posting pictures of yourself in a club. Meanwhile, the others are jumping rope.’” She apparently went away and jumped rope (or skipped, as we’d say over here) every day for a year, securing a slot in the next casting.
He wants all his models to be healthy and happy, and they are a world away from the cadaverous clothes-horses you usually see at fashion weeks.
Later, I take my seat at the show, which has returned to Manhattan after a brief spell in London last year.
The enthusiastic Americanness of New York is a better fit for Victoria’s Secret, a brand that requires you to shed your cynicism with your clothes.
“It’s all about girl power,” says Lily Donaldson, of the aforementioned Alpine Angel look. But mostly, I think, it’s all about having a bit of fun. — The Daily Telegraph