See Kate Upton in American Vogue.
In the magazine's July issue, she models some of fall's finest items of fashion, including a including $2,000 leg-sized cigars Givenchy has ingeniously recast as shoes, a $4,000 fur-trimmed coat by Michael Kors, a $690 Hermes hat, and a blue Altuzarra blazer and skirt ($2,300 and $1,700 respectively). So there to anyone who thought she was cheap. It's a far cry from what GQ did to her:
And what Esquire did to her:
Vogue's story on Upton makes it sounds like she's interested in doing more of the clothed type of modeling — the type of modeling that says, "You look great wearing lots of weird expensive things at once" (high fashion modeling) as opposed to the type that says, "Isn't my rack SPLENDID?" (calendar or men's magazine modeling). Vogue writes that even though Upton isn't super rail runway model thin (of course she's thin, but not nearly as thin as many runway models) her career might not end in men's magazine purgatory:
The embracing of a vuluptuous woman on a catwalk is not without precedent — curvaceous luminaries such as Miranda Kerr and Doutzen Kroes have managed to traverse the territory between Victoria's Secret Angeld and devilishly high-flying runways (Prada, Louis Vuitton) with ease. Now it could well be Upton's turn.
The term "curvaceous" is used loosely in the fashion industry. Here's Miranda Kerr:
And here's Doutzen Kroes:
I predict we'll see a lot more of Kate Upton in women's magazines and on the runways. One, no one can stop looking at her. And two, just think of all the publicity awaiting whichever designer casts her first for a show? Yes, this woman may have a splendid rack but her near-future destiny will probably be covering it (mostly) up. I think she's just as much a women's model as a men's model. For years the reigning definition of "curvy" in the fashion industry has been whatever walks down the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show runway. And those women wear padding in their bras and go on liquid diets and work out twice a day leading up to the show. The result is a slew of very thin, distractingly buff bodies. They don't necessarily look curvy, like everyone in fashion says — they look buff thin (buffin?). And if there's anything more unattainable than thin, it's buff thin. Upton, meanwhile, doesn't have chiseled abs that could shatter a champagne flute on contact — her body is more real. It's very unreal, yes, but it's also more like an average woman's than a lot of what's "curvy" in fashion now.
So here's to Kate Upton covering up and modeling more women's clothes! Fall will be here before we know it and bikinis aren't all-weather ensembles, anyway.