Model Woman

As those who have visited my beautiful women picture blog understand, some of the most beautiful women of all time have been models.  Once simply women who displayed clothes, cosmetics, and other products, they became icons of style and beauty.  Other women have wanted to be like them, while men have wanted to be with them.  Those women who have emulated models and those men who have fallen in love with them have modeling agent Eileen Ford, who died today at 92, to thank for either their inspirations or infatuations.

Mrs. Ford's namesake modeling agency, which she founded with her husband Jerry, set the standard for how modeling agencies are run and how, at their best, they take care of the women they represent.  Mrs. Ford, a onetime model herself, was the Brian Epstein of the trade, shepherding her clients with parental devotion and always looking out for their best interests, constantly developing for them high standards of elegance and beauty.  She got them better pay and jobs of high class and high profiles.  Anyone whom she didn't trust around her girls was kept at a distance.  And the girls she discovered read like a who's who of modeling: Jean Shrimpton, Ann Turkel, Sondra Peterson, Donna Mitchell, Jerry Hall, and Christie Brinkley are just some of the women she represented.  Among the models she discovered who became actresses were Ali MacGraw, Candice Bergen, Susan Blakely, Rene Russo, Kim Basinger, and Lauren Hutton.

One of her greatest discoveries was by accident.  Noticing a young woman while walking down the stairs at Bonwit Teller department store in New York, Mrs. Ford was struck by the appearance of the woman, who turned out to be an aspiring French-language teacher from Mississippi who had grown impatient waiting for the elevator, and encouraged her to consider modeling.  The young woman, an attractive, tall woman with an irregular nose, took her advice. Soon she was appearing in numerous fashion editorials, but a cosmetics contract would make her a legend.  The woman was Estée Lauder spokesmodel Karen Graham, my first celebrity crush. :-)  This is just one example of how Mrs. Ford was instrumental in making this planet a lovelier place to live.  

The modeling trade changed over time, and Mrs. Ford's management style was soon seen as dated; of course, she eventually retired.  And while the agency she founded may be a shadow of its former self, Eileen Ford remained sharp and resolute all of her life.  RIP.