Ali Michael: Bulimia one season, Balenciaga the next

ali michael, balenciaga SS09/wwd

“On Tuesday morning in Paris, as the fashion elite were gathering at the Balenciaga show, 17-year-old model Ali Michael was heading home to the U.S. far earlier than anticipated”. So read the lead of Christina Binkley’s February 28th Wall Street Journal story “Wasn’t skinny supposed to be out of fashion?". Fast forward to Tuesday 30th September and there is Michael, in Balenciaga’s SS09 show.

Balenciaga is a great get for any model – and it tops off a very successful comeback season for Michael, whose many other SS09 shows have included Burberry and Christian Dior.

However the Balenciaga coup seems nothing short of extraordinary for a model who, as Binkley reported, was told by Paris casting directors last season that she was too fat because she had gained 5lbs – and who later went on the record about her battles with an eating disorder and the unrealistic pressures on runway models to be thin.

Many, including Michael herself, believed this critical commentary on the modelling business could spell the end of her career.

At the time, some of the comments from anonymous industry insiders on blogs such as COACD were fairly revealing.

One commenter suggested that casting agents boycott American models altogether and only use foreign girls - apparently inferring that "foreign" girls can be better counted on to put up and shut up.


lanvin FW0708 - march 07/style.com


anna sui, FW0809 - feb 08/style.com

What happened in the interim? That’s the real story here.

Did Michael return to the shows exactly the same weight that she was in February, but as a ‘celebrity’ this time, buoyed by all the publicity? Or did she in fact lose weight? Some seem to think so.