Model Gisele Bündchen has opened up about the “trauma” she faced during 1998’s Alexander McQueen fashion show.
In a new interview with Vogue, where the 41-year-old broke down 22 of her looks from 1982 till now, she pointed out the moment when she felt very “traumatised” during the 1998 McQueen show.
“I mean, I didn’t speak English,” she said, while looking at a photograph of herself in a silver breast-bearing outfit from the ramp.
“It was my first show season in London. I did 42 castings. I remember going to all these castings and nobody would even look at my book because it was the heroin chic time and I didn’t look nothing like the heroin chic, obviously, as you can see in the picture.”
Speaking of the McQueen show, she said: “I went to do this casting for Alexander McQueen and there were girls around the block. There were like a thousand girls. It was the craziest thing.
“And he [McQueen] was just sitting on this couch and he would just go and say, walk. And he would put you in these impossible shoes.”
Bündchen also recalled she didn’t have a fitting, so when she showed up at the show, she wondered what she was wearing.
“I, I could say like a few words but I didn’t understand half the things,” she recalled.
“I just pretended I understood. And I was like, ‘Is it a T-shirt or something?’ No, it was this. So I started crying.”
Bündchen said she was so upset the makeup artist had to ask her to stop crying as her tears were ruining her make-up.
“I was walking the whole time thinking, ‘I hope my dad doesn’t ever see this picture,’” the supermodel said. “That’s why I have the memory of this show, all I wanted to do was leave but you know, it’s one of those things that make you stronger.”
