TRANSSEXUAL MODELMANIA

By Brianna Austin:




With all the hype that has been surrounding the lead up to appearance of ISIS, the transgender model that will appear on America’s Next Top Mode season premiere, I couldn’t help wondering what all the excitement was about.

ANTM is bathing in all the media hype, Janice Dickinson is sniping Oh, please, I did it on my show first with Claudia,” (in an interview that appeared on New York Mag.com) and Simon Doonan -- Barney's creative director and author of "Eccentric Glamour" – said he agreed with Dickinson that the world of high fashion might be ready for a transgender model.

While the appearance of a transgender model is a first for ANTP, it is not by any stretch a first for the fashion industry. Might be ready? Hello? There have been transsexual models on the world stage of fashion for nearly a half a century. Some of the top names, but certainly not the only names, include socialite April Ashley in the 1960s, Amanda Lear and Caroline “Tula” Cossey in the 70's, and Terri Toye and Lauren Foster in the 80s/90s -- all of whom worked with the biggest designers of their time on the runway and in the leading fashion magazines – including Vogue.

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