Julia Beynon - The Winning Model

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Julia Beynon - The Winning Model
Topic Started: Mar 16 2005, 01:09 PM (546 Views)
Fanatic	Mar 16 2005, 01:09 PM Post #1
Administrator Posts: 730 Group: Admin Member #1 Joined: February 13, 2005	Mon Mar 14, 2:36 PM ET Lauren David Peden Fashion Wire Daily March 14, 2005 - NEW YORK - Designer Jay McCarroll wasn’t the only big winner in Bravo’s Project Runway reality TV horse race, which ended last month in what can only be termed an upset when McCarroll beat front-runner Kara Saun, going home with the $100,000 purse, a one-year management contract and a fashion spread in Elle magazine, among other once-in-a-lifetime prizes. Though she didn’t get a cash prize and already had an agency (New York Model Management), McCarroll’s spread in Elle’s June issue will feature 20-year-old Julia Beynon, the model who wore his creations in his winning runway show during New York Fashion Week. Beynon, though new to New York Fashion Week and mainstream magazines, has actually been modeling for eight years, first in her native California and more recently in New York, where she moved in 2003 to study graphic design at Pratt Institute. The always-a-catalog-model-never-a-cover-girl put her studies on hold during the Project Runway taping, a gambit that paid off big, poised, as she now is, on the brink of mainstream supermodeldom (something her agency is hoping to replicate with its NY/LA Bolt Model Search, a three-month national contest that kicks off March 21st and will award $250,000 in modeling contracts to three lucky winners; get more info at www.nextnewface.com). Fashion Wire Daily caught up with the pragmatic Beynon to get the scoop on what it was like to do Project Runway, what she thought of the Wendy v. Kara Saun Smackdown and what was up with Morgan, The Model From Hell. FWD: How did you get involved with Project Runway? JB: I actually got it through my agency. They called me about two days before we started shooting and told me that I had been booked on a reality show. I had no idea what I was getting into. I could have said no, but I was like sure why not. I figured it would be an exciting experience and I don’t know when else I would have gotten the chance to do something like this. FWD: Are you a fan of reality TV shows in general? JB: I’m not against them. There are some shows that I definitely like more than others and I have followed a couple of them. FWD: So you weren’t at all concerned about winding up like the girls on America’s Top Model? I mean, how many of them really go on to be top models? JB: That show I have a different opinion about. I don’t see how you can go on to a show like that. You don’t become a top model from [being on] a supermodel show. You become a top model from working and getting your name out there and from experience. That is why I was okay with this show because it was for designers and I was just modeling their clothes. And the fact that I could win a spread in Elle Magazine was really cool. FWD: Did you live at home during the taping, or did all the models move in together? JB: The designers were the only ones that lived in an apartment together. They were filmed 24/7 pretty much. We were only filmed from the moment we showed up at Parsons in the morning until we left. FWD: Were you still going on castings or were you not suppose to do that while you were taping the show? JB: We could but we just didn’t have that much time. We were filming two or three days a week for the entire day. Sometimes we had to be there at 6:30 in the morning and would be there until 1:00 a.m. I was too tired to do anything else. FWD: What was the biggest challenge of doing the show? JB: At first it was hard to get used to being filmed all the time and becoming comfortable in front of a camera. I realized once I started doing the show that you pretty much have a camera around you at all times and there is always someone listening and always somebody watching. It’s not like I was careful… I was myself. I didn’t do anything bad. I wasn’t one of the bitchy girls. FWD: You were professional. Unlike, say, Morgan. Do you think the show has had a detrimental affect on her career? JB: I saw her after we filmed the show; at a gig my boyfriend [hip-hop musician R.C.] was playing. She came with her mom and I asked her what was going on since the show and she wasn’t too happy with how they had portrayed [her] in the long run like after the whole thing filmed. They kind of pegged her as the drama queen. We all had our moments but I think they, for some reason, decided to overdo it a little bit with her. FWD: In terms of the actual runway shows on Project Runway, other than the winning one, did you have a favorite look that you modeled? JB: I did. I really, really liked Jay’s bathing suit. It was a little tight but that was okay. I really, really wished that he had won that challenge. I still think that he deserved to win that challenge. FWD: Were you closest to Jay out of all the designers? JB: In the beginning I was close to Alexandra. She used me three times in the beginning. And then Austin used me once for the wedding dress [competition] but I think that he felt that was a disaster, so I didn’t think he would use me again. Then Jay started picking me and he just kept picking me and picking me every time and we kind of just became a little pair after that. FWD: Did you actually have time to develop a friendship? Like, does he know you go to Pratt? JB: Yeah, he knows a lot about me. He knows my boyfriend. I met his parents. I saw him the other night; we went out to a party. He knows that I’m a graphic designer and an artist. He even said it on the reunion show which I was really happy about. I think he just liked my personality and we are both laid back and kind of goofy. It works. FWD: Were the models aware of the drama going on between the designers, like with Wendy and Kara Saun? JB: Yeah, we saw a lot of it but at the same time they tried to keep the models and the designers separate as much as they could. I’m not sure why. First of all they didn’t let us know who was eliminated. What they wanted to happen was the models would do the show, go offstage and then we would go into holding so we wouldn’t be able to hear anything. They would do the Q and A on the runway with the designers and we were not supposed to know who was eliminated until we came out for the model elimination and saw who wasn’t sitting there [because the losing designer’s model was automatically eliminated]. You are like Oh my God blah blah is gone. Of course we found out. There are tons of PAs and so they started closing the room off more and not letting people in because we kept finding out who was eliminated. FWD: Other than the fact that you were his model do you think Jay is the designer that deserved to win? JB: I do. I really think he deserved to win. Before the fashion show everyone had the idea that Kara Saun was going to win — and she was very confident in herself. She had won a lot of challenges during the show and Jay had never won a challenge. He worked really hard but he always came in second place. In the runway show it was kind of funny to hear people’s opinions changing because of how strong Jay’s line was. I loved [Kara Saun’s] line and her clothes and what she can do with leather but her final collection was too Aviator/Tom Ford 1998. Everything Jay designed came out of his head. He is a creative person and he has the ability to have his own style as a designer and do something new. FWD: What about Heidi Klum? Was she helpful to the girls or was it more like she came in and shot her stuff and left? JB: The second thing. I was kind of disappointed by that. I wish she could have been around us more because I would have liked to actually talk to her but we didn’t get to see her that much. FWD: So what are you doing now? Are you back in school? JB: I’m not back in school yet. I took a leave of absence for two years. [I’m] a sophomore so I have a while to go. I really, really want to go back. But depending on how my career goes after this will be the deciding factor of when I go back to school. Both of my parents are graphic designers, so I’m just really drawn to graphic design and all the fine arts. I paint and do photography. I’m interested in everything from welding to sculpting. I want to find a way to incorporate all that into my [work] without computers. Graphic design did exist before the computer. It’s been lost and I kind of want to bring it back to its roots and do, like, mixed media hands-on graphic design. [You can check out Benyon’s graphic design work on her website: www.daphnedesigns.com.] FWD: So was the Project Runway show your first NY Fashion Week show? JB: Yes, it was my first tent show. It was exciting. It was fun. FWD: So for you is this Elle thing a big deal? JB: Yes. It’s a big name to add to my portfolio. FWD: Since they are doing a second season, any advice for the next crop of models doing Project Runway? JB: When I went on this show my best method was to be myself and I’m not very dramatic or anything. If you want a lot of air time be a drama queen but I just chose to be myself and I’m goofy. It worked for me. Be yourself and be confident and don’t be scared of the camera. FWD: What does your family think of all this? JB: My family is ecstatic. My parents won’t shut up about everything. Source: FWD



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