Italian model and actress Isabella Rossellini believes celebrities are stealing jobs from models now more than ever. Isabella first emerged as a model aged 28 and she believes that models these days have very limited careers because work most often dries up for them in their 30s. She has personally experienced ageism in the fashion industry when people initially found out her age and were shocked. She commented on her start:
”In two or three photo-shoots I had the cover of Vogue and my career exploded. But I didn’t know that ageism was rampant in fashion. No one asked me how old I was at the beginning, and when they found out, they were horrified.”
Isabella has seen that more and more celebrities are landing big name campaigns, which leaves models without work. She believes people these days are simply generally more interested in celebrities which is why actresses of any age seem to be doing better than models currently when it comes to fashion campaigns:
“Models are not doing so many of the campaigns – it’s actresses. Now, there is a celebrity fixation. And if they are in a successful film when they are 38 or 40, they still get the campaigns.”
The actress points out that now models have no career opportunities by the time they’re in their mid-30s, but celebrities keep going on the strength of their fame alone and regularly land campaigns for huge fashion labels: ‘It’s the celebrity that gives them the longevity. Most models start working less at 30, and then by the time they are 35 it’s over completely.”
