Fresh face

MODEL SUCCESS:Faye Dinsmore is the latest Irish model to hit the big time, but she has no illusions about the industry, writes DEIRDRE McQUILLAN

IRELAND’S LATEST MODELLING success is a 22-year-old student of French and Classics at Trinity College who flits between New York, London and Paris, tweeting and blogging. Faye Dinsmore’s bright, entertaining reports on her adventures and forthright opinions on the backstage life of a model give a rare insider’s view of the industry (she currently has 120,000 Facebook fans). With that alone, she is establishing her own persona.

Although her catwalk career has taken her from Dublin to the international fashion capitals, her lucrative work has been for catalogues, campaigns and bridal magazines in locations as far apart as Glasgow, Germany and the Caribbean. Most recently, her looks, all pale skin and russet hair, have made her the choice of Rootstein Mannequins, the first Irish model to be selected by the mannequin design company as embodying contemporary ideas of beauty. As “a silent ambassador of style” as she puts it, she will be following in the footsteps of supermodels such as Erin O’Connor, Yasmin Le Bon and Agyness Deyn, with her likeness decorating shop-window displays in cities everywhere.

We meet during London Fashion Week, where she is appearing in a number of catwalk shows having just flown in from New York. Curled up like a cat on the chair, stroking her vintage fur jacket and smoking, she is blasé about her success. She is from a family of 14, from Ballintra in Donegal, and got her first break in a Robbie Williams video, while working part-time as a waitress in the Sandhouse Hotel in Rossnowlagh. As a fresher in Trinity in 2008, her modelling debut came about when she took part in a fashion show for the Science Gallery. This led to further bookings and so much subsequent work in Dublin that that she eventually decided to put her academic studies on hold for two years.

“I had nothing to lose. Growing up, the idea of being a model couldn’t have been further from my mind. At the beginning I didn’t tell my friends and they used to wonder why I was leaving parties early and getting up early. I’m liked because I’m pale and ginger – you have to have your niche and that is mine.”

Before leaving Paris in August, she had worked 46 days in a row. “I never expected things to go so well. Having decided to give it a shot, I am now so incredibly lucky.”

Not many Irish models, with the exception of Laragh McCann and Catriona Balfe, have developed international careers. Dinsmore broke the mould by seeking work abroad, and her ability to speak French gave her a particular advantage. “I’m always asked why there are so few Irish models, but I was not encouraged to go anywhere. I was told I was too short, too fat, and not pretty enough.

“When I came to London last October, I discovered how different things are there. In Dublin you rarely go to a casting, but in London, any day you’re not working, you are doing between five and 15 castings. I had three this morning and there could be up to 20 other girls doing the same.

“You show your book. Casting directors can be awful. In New York they want big smiles and teeth. Paris is a lot more about edgy editorials and London is very London cool.”

She has strong views on the controversy over underweight models. “I don’t know how designers can work with a girl who is starving herself. There’s a difference between those who are starving and those who are thin. I am thin, I would say skinny, but everyone in my family is lanky. I do a lot of Bikram yoga, but you have to be sensible about your weight. If you starve, you mess up your metabolism. I thought the Burberry show was the worst in terms of underweight models.” She’s full of praise for the Model Sanctuary in London, a place where nutritional and psychological support are given to models during fashion week. She describes the initiative, set up by Erin O’Connor and the British Fashion Council, as “five floors of heaven”.

Dinsmore argues that models, like actors, should have a union, and is scathing about the way the Irish media describes girls with too much fake tan and blonde hair as top models.

What she enjoys most about her career is “working with a cool team and with people who are passionate about what they want from a shoot. I have a good relationship with photographers and having studied drama helps.”

She hates shopping, lives out of a suitcase and when she goes home, she raids her older sisters’ closets: “I steal my mother’s old hats and wear my brother’s jackets. I’ll wear anything.”

Dinsmore’s future ambitions seem to be divided between becoming a primary school teacher and notions about having an organic farm miles from anywhere, as she misses the countryside.

In the meantime, she has few illusions about the industry, and is practical about her success. “I don’t like the fashion world that much because it is so superficial and a lot of people working in it aren’t very nice. But in saying that, I have met some great people, too.

“I’ve tried reading Vogue, but gave up because it’s all advertorial. There’s a lot of smoke and mirrors in this business – it’s like the music industry in some ways. There are insiders and hundreds of bands and only a few that make it. I am making the most of it now, but I will quit completely as soon as it goes down.”