'We probably weren’t treated as well as models now, but I don’t think they have as much fun,’ says Amber Valletta
Amber Valletta is the latest supermodel struck down with a case of 90s nostalgia, revealing what apartment life was like with BFFs Kate Moss and Shalom Harlow during the good days.
After Cindy Crawford spilled all on the decade's brilliant all-pasta diet, and Kate and Naomi announced a Gogglebox reunion, Amber has shared her own experiences of hanging out with 'the big girls'.
‘Shalom [Harlow] and I were living together then, and one day she brought Kate Moss over to the apartment and was like 'I just met this cute little girl, we fell in love on this shoot, we’re friends,'’ she told IntoTheGloss. ‘Kate didn’t even have Calvin Klein yet! The three of us would just kind of skulk around everywhere. Then the big girls—Linda, Christy, and Naomi—started being nice to us and showing us the ropes. It was so different—we probably weren’t treated as well as models are now, but I don’t think they have as much fun as we did.’
Image: Amber Valletta, Kate Moss and Shalom Harlow in 1996
‘Once I graduated in '91, I started working full-time immediately,’ she explained of her break in the industry. ‘My mom paid for me to learn how to model at a local agency when I was 15, which is how I got scouted. I went to Europe that summer, which is what everyone did back then when they were starting out. I just wanted to get out of Oklahoma! So I went and I got my first job two weeks later in Milan.’
Image: Amber Valletta, Kate Moss and Naomi Campbell in 1999.
Amber, now 40, still models on uber occasions (like Lanvin’s 125th anniversary show in Paris last month) but has since turned her main focus to design, founding luxe ethical fashion label Master & Muse in 2013. And when we say it’s haute we mean it - there’s not a hessian sack in sight.
‘I’ve been a big environmentalist for a long time, Amber explained. ‘I noticed that there's a lot of talk about how to clean up the supply chain in the fashion industry for the workers' sake and the environment. So I started researching and finding there were a lot of cool, young brands who are making things the right way. Once I started seeing what was possible, I was like, 'Well, I want to be able to buy stuff like this and I’m sure there are other women who think like I do who would like to buy this way!'’