The Girl Who Definitely Did Not Book Prada
“This is Madeline. She is 13 and has brown hair.” I stood and nodded my head in agreement, even though I was not 13 and did not have brown hair. However, my name was still Madeline.
In the secretive world of high-fashion modeling in Tokyo, white lies slide off the tongue at the same rate that a Japanese businessman slurps ramen during his lunch break.
For Japanese modeling agents, lying is the norm. They hid the fact that I was really 15 and had bright red hair. While I was only two years older than the age my agents told clients and had hair color different from that on my composite card, it determined whether I would book a job or not.
Clients saw my barely-shaven-above-the-knee persona as alluring. I played the girl who still wasn’t ready to use tampons. The one who went to school dances with a group of girlfriends. No boys allowed.
I was kawaii. By saying I was 13, it transformed me from an average 15-year-old with her learner’s permit to an innocent doll, ready to smile for whatever cheesy catalog client would book me.
Being the doll was not the only role I undertook in Japan. Since my hair was red, I was categorized as a “quirky” model. When the off-brand high-fashion magazine came calling, new lies were invented.
As I was shuttled from the minivan to the waiting room, I was transformed into the “girl who was on hold for Prada.”
I stood and stared at the client, usually a Yohji Yamamoto-esque knockoff, and made sure my middle part looked like Wednesday Addams.
I became the cool girl who was just “stopping by” Japan for a few weeks. I exuded the confidence of a seasoned model — one who stays at the Grand Hyatt in Tokyo, not in a crowded model apartment.
This “cool girl” role was fake, too. My agents never told the clients the truth: I had not booked a job in weeks and I was five days away from being sent home.
This comment never came up when the photo editor was flipping through my book. I stared at him in silence, hoping that my silence would be taken for exclusivity, something the magazine just had to have.
After two months of lying, the truth was eventually revealed by the fact that I wasn’t booking as many jobs as the actual 13-year-old kawaii model from Russia.
I did not book Prada, nor would I ever. My face was not on a billboard in Times Square, and I think the only time I even went there was to use the restroom at a Starbucks.
For the Japanese modeling market, lies made money. While each model’s story shifted from client to client, casting to casting, our job was to place our hands at our side and go along with it.
Who needs the truth when it will probably just get lost in translation anyway?
