Oxford Fashion Week's Tiffany Saunders on her career in modelling

Modelling is an industry like no other... there is a lot more to it than turning up and smiling in front of a camera,” says Tiffany Saunders, who has gone from being the face of Oxford Fashion Week to one of the organisers.

“It’s hard work at times and you’ve got to be prepared to spend 12 hours outside on a cold day in mid February shooting a new spring summer collection as well as owning a runway while wearing beautiful outfits, surrounded by photographers.”

But it’s clearly an industry the former Wood Green schoolgirl, who went on to gain a degree in hospitality management at Oxford Brookes University, loves.

“It’s hard work and it can be stressful, but it is an amazing industry.”

She’s been modelling for more than 20 years and despite some dark days battling anorexia, which she doesn’t blame on her career (see panel), is enthusiastic about life both on the catwalk and behind the scenes.

“It’s an industry that I’ve known for as long as I can remember,” says Tiffany, 24.

“It’s something that I’ve always enjoyed doing but wasn’t necessarily something I thought I’d do full time. I did photoshoots and shows from the age of four.

“When I was 15 I signed with a commercial modelling agency.

“Over the next few years I was modelling more frequently than I had been, and with more high profile clients, and spending much more time in London.

“However despite becoming busier with modelling work, my education always came first.”

A turning point came in 2009 when her step-father Mike heard an advertisment on the radio for Oxford Fashion Week and suggested she applied.

After attending a casting, Tiffany was delighted to be chosen not only as a model for the shows but also as the Face of Fashion Week.

“At an OFW show I met someone who introduced me to an agency in London, and from there my modelling career grew,” says Tiffany.

“I am now signed with Zone Models and work for them full time.

“I love my job but it’s not always easy and certainly not a constant state of glitz and glamour.

“It’s a job that grants me the variety and spontaneity that I thrive on, while meeting lots of fun and creative people along the way.

“No two days are the same, and while the uncertainly of never knowing my timetable until the last minute can be a pain, the benefits of my job and my passion for it wins every time.”

Tiffany gets her modelling jobs in one of three ways.

“Either it is as a result of a casting that Zone send me to, or its through a direct booking whereby a client rings Zone and books me without a casting, or I get contacted directly,” she says.

“Assignments can range from a look book for a high street shop’s new collection, a hair show abroad, to runway show and everything in between.

“Earnings in modelling are as varied as the assignments. You always need to bear in mind that the industry is unpredictable: you never know where or when your next pay check will come through.

“You have to budget carefully as the job also involves paying to travel all over London to get to castings.”

And do models survive on a diet of black coffee and Marlboro Lights?

“This is a very general stereotype and in my experience this is laughable,” says Tiffany.

“A healthy, well-balanced diet is common place on the modelling scene in most cases. Long days shooting or rehearsing require the model to have energy. It is very image based, but overall a healthy diet and everything in moderation is key.”

She says there are the occasional situations where insensitivity is expressed but “you just have realise that you can’t please everybody. You will always be too this for one client or too that for another. The only view that should be valued in the view that you have for and of yourself”.

Tiffany knows how intimidating it can feel to go to a casting (“I still find that sometimes and casting is something that I do all the time”), so empathises with models who are involved for the first time with OFW.

Tiffany has been involved with the event every year since her debut and is currently working on this OFW which runs from November 3 to 8 at various venues around the city.

“In recent seasons I have taken a more senior role in Oxford Fashion Week, from model director to show curator to now assistant director of the week, and I really enjoy my new role,” says Tiffany.

“I still get to model in the fantastic runway shows as well.”

Tiffany Saunders and Carl Anglim

'THE BEGINNINGS OF A BEAUTIFUL RELATIONSHIP'

A boost to her career isn’t the only thing Tiffany has Oxford Fashion Week to thank for.

“I’m in a wonderful relationship with my partner, Carl Anglim,” she says happily. “Carl and I met at the Oxford Fashion Week 2009 Black and White Launch party at The Living Room in the Oxford Castle complex.

“From then we became good friends. Carl has been of invaluable support to me on so many occasions and was a frequent visitor to me while I was unwell in hospital.

“Towards the end of 2013 our friendship changed, and in early 2014 we started our relationship.”

Carl is the founder and director of OFW.

“We have worked together on Oxford Fashion Week for a number of years, so in that respect nothing has changed,” says Tiffany. “We both have senior roles within the organisation and continue to work closely with a team of creative directors and curators. I began life as a model, then face, then model-trainer, then runway directing and now assistant director for the entire week.”

TIFFANY TELLS OF BATTLING BLACK CLOUD OF ANOREXIA

I was diagnosed with anorexia in 2012. I think it was widely perceived that my modelling career was to blame, but that was very much not the case.

Eating disorders are not about vanity, they are not about attention and their effects and consequence should not be undermined. Anorexia is a devastating illness that affects not only the person who has been diagnosed, but for their friends and family as well.

I’m extremely lucky to have a fantastic support network of family and close friends who supported me in getting the help I needed to get better.

When you have a mental health disorder it’s an incredibly lonely place. No matter how many people you have around you, if you think that you’re the only one with these strange, illogical thought processes then even in a crowd of people you feel separate.

It’s a condition that I didn’t understand, and that frustrated me. It wasn’t something I could take medication for and it wasn’t something that I could find a sure-fire solution for, with even the most thorough of Google searches.

Everyone is different, and so the cure for one’s eating disorder lies solely in that individual. Restricting food intake is a symptom of the illness, but it’s not the cause.

If you had asked me a few years ago what I thought of eating disorders I would have suggested the cure lay quite simply in eating more if you are underweight and eating less if you are overweight. However I know now that if it was that simple then eating disorders would not have the highest fatality rate of any mental illness.

There are two sides to the solution: your mind and your body. You can’t fix one without the other. It shouldn’t be assumed that a person with a normal BMI doesn’t have a eating disorder. Because they could have.

Skin and bones do not define an eating disorder. It’s what you can’t see.

That’s what so many people just can’t understand and I don’t blame them. No one can fully comprehend it.

But instead of coming to your own conclusion that this dreadful illness is an attention-seeking vanity-obsessed phase, stop and think about the torment that is a constant black cloud in world of anorexia.

In my case severe anxiety was a big part of why I got so ill, but with a lot of hard work, time, support and strength I got to where I am now.

I used to me ashamed that I had anorexia. I used to try and hide it. Pretend it wasn’t there. But now I’m not ashamed. I won’t say the word anorexia in hush tones as if it should be treated as a taboo subject.

And I don’t let a day past where I don’t take a moment to stop and think about where I am now compared to where I was when I was ill.

It is a very difficult illness to overcome, and doesn’t have to kill you to take your life. I understand that it can be a difficult subject to talk about, but it should be talked about, it should be debated about. It shouldn’t be whispered about.

For more details of Oxford Fashion Week, go to oxfordfashionweek.co.uk

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