Models like Gemma Ward & Ali Michael speak candidly about eating disorders and body image in fashion

For decades, models battled eating disorders and harsh criticism about their bodies while working in the fashion industry — and were expected to shut up and deal with it.

But now, the culture is slowly changing. And in a new Vogue video, several successful models have spoken candidly about weight and body image issues in the fashion industry, touching on everything from size nondiscrimination to starving for the ‘perfect’ body.

Opening up for the five-part docu-series ‘The Models,’ women like Gemma Ward, Haley Clauson, and Candice Huffine are sharing their emotional experiences, with some breaking down in tears on camera.

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The women’s stories all different, from tales of eating disorders to being told outright that they weren’t thin enough.

Gemma Ward, the youngest model to appear on the cover of American Vogue, has spoken out about her eating disorder and poor relationship with food when she was younger.

Then, after her boyfriend Heath Ledger died in 2008, the now-31-year-old took a break from modeling — and put on a few pounds, which tabloids cruelly called out.

She broke down crying in the video as she said, ‘I feel like I was publicly shamed but, you know, it also just, like, shouldn’t be a big deal, really. But it did affect me at the time. I wanted to hide. 

‘And I didn’t want to have people, kind of, putting cameras in my face and putting me on the front covers of newspapers.’ 

Ali Michael, 28, has walked the runway for Chanel, Christian Dior, Karl Lagerfeld, and Lanvin, and posed for magazines like Elle, Harper’s Bazaar, and W. 

But earlier in her career, she remembers the pressure to be thin and lose weight — at the bidding of her agency — turning into an eating disorder. 

‘I went to meet with the agency and they measured me. And they told me that I need to lose, I think it was two inches off my hips. And maybe two off my waist. I was a perfectionist so I associated doing a good job with modeling with losing the weight,’ she said.

‘So I did. And it started out with just being more mindful, I guess, and then it did escalate. My lowest weight was 98 lbs. when I was 17. And that was after I had just done a very successful season in Paris.’

While that seems extreme, when she put on even a few pounds, she found herself losing jobs — and landing mortifying headlines. 

‘I went to Paris, and after the first day of castings my agency told me that the response from my first day of castings for shows was that I had gained too much weight and was unusable for the shows,’ she said. 

‘We flew home the following day, and the day after that there was a headline on the front page of the fashion section of the Wall Street Journal that said, “Model Ali Michael Sent Home for Being Too Fat.”‘

The WSJ story in question, from February 2008, didn’t actually say that in the headline, but the gist of the piece was to that effect. 

‘To have this expose on the thing that I felt most insecure about in my life reaching everyone was absolutely mortifying,’ she said.

She’s not the only one to open up about an eating disorder — and the fact that it was rewarded by the industry. 

Aiden Curtiss, 20, said that at her thinnest and ‘sickest’ she got the best feedback.

‘A couple weeks before my first season started, my ex-boyfriend and I got in a giant fight. I kind of went to this really, really low place where I couldn’t eat, just kind of lost, like, a lot of weight from that,’ she said.

‘And then when I went to my agency and took digital [photos], I got all these options [for gigs] — which was when I was, like, the sickest I’ve ever been.’ 

Meanwhile, 28-year-old Sarah Stephens, recalled being publicly shamed and humiliated over her figure by a cruel designer.

‘There was one casting in London. I was 17,’ she said. I remember walking into the room full of people and the designer gave me this bodysuit to put on. There was no changing room. 

‘She made me just get naked and she took one look at my body and kind of snickered and laughed, and said, “That’s not gonna work.” And then walked out of the room. Left me there naked to put back on my clothes in a room full of people.’

Myla Dalbesio, 32, said she has had similarly negative feedback about her body, and it’s left a lasting effect.

‘What I was receiving for many years was that my body was not right. And it’s almost impossible to erase that,’ she said in the video, crying. 

‘And I thought that I had really gotten it under control and that I was in a really healthy place and I earlier this month got the opportunity to cast for this job that I’ve wanted for my whole career. And they tell you a month ahead of time so you can “get ready for it.” And the entire month was like torture for me.’

She didn’t even end up getting the job. 

The problems seem to have touched even some of the biggest names in modeling. Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue cover girl Haley Clauson, 24, appears to be at the top of her game — but she revealed that years ago, when she gained a put of weight during puberty, she was written off and nearly told her career was over.

‘I came into this industry as a teenager and then I hit puberty and I was no longer that teenager anymore. I had boobs and my body wasn’t as stick skinny anymore so I was pressured to go back to being that runway girl,’ she said. 

‘I almost was told that modeling was done for me. And then Sports Illustrated kind of relaunched my career, so it was a really amazing moment because it was me being me on the cover of a magazine and fully being accepted and embracing myself,’ she said.

Candice Huffine, 34, knows a thing or two about having an ‘atypical’ fashion body: She’s made a name for herself as one of the first major plus-size models, racking up gigs with magazines like Vogue, W, and Glamour, and designers like Prabal Gurung, Sophie Theallet, and Christian Siriano.  

And she has seemed to fare better than many when it comes to embracing her figure — though it helps that she knows that she has made other women feel good about themselves.

‘This image, where I’ve put myself out there in this way, or I’ve been really vulnerable, and really and shown it all and just gone for it has helped, in some domino effect, this woman look at herself differently, put on a bikini, go to the beach, have fun with her friends, and it completely changed why and how I do this job,’ she said.

Plus-size model Paloma Elsesser, 27, also talked about confidence and feeling good.

‘People are always like, “How are you so confident? Like, where did you get it?” I worked really hard to be … OK with who I am and to do what I care about, which at the end of the day is just creating space for more people to feel seen,’ she said.