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sammit. Fashion/Style ~ Fashion, beauty and shopping ideas from former Tribune style editor Sam Mittelsteadt.

Archive for May, 2007

Win: Lippmann nail polish

May 12th, 2007, 12:03 pm by Sam Mittelsteadt

Another reader giveaway! I’ve got two bottles of Call Me, a bright orange from the Vinyl collection of trendy seasonal shades by former Valley resident and nail entrepreneur Deborah Lippmann. (The Vinyl line is available only at Bath & Body Works stores.)To enter, click on this link and send me a message with your name, mailing address and the subject line VINYL, plus the answer to this question: Name the recording artist who made "Call Me" a hit in the 1980s as the theme to the Richard Gere movie "American Gigolo." I’ll draw two winners from the entries received by noon Friday, May 18.UPDATED: Congratuations to Sarah Hinz-Bridger of Chandler and Kay Klingler of Mesa, whose names were drawn at random out of the entries received.(Or should I say, out of all five of the entries received. Come on, people, the question wasn’t that damn difficult. Get those fingers more active — all you have to do is fill out a form.)By the way, the answer was Blondie.

Win: Kiss My Face foot duo

May 12th, 2007, 11:55 am by Sam Mittelsteadt

Kiss my what?! My Great Stuff column this Sunday talks about the new Foot Scrub and Foot Creme from the all-natural skin care line Kiss My Face, and I’ve got one pair of products to give to a reader.To enter, click on this link to send me an e-mail that includes your name and mailing address, the subject line KISS MY FACE and also the answer to this question: The sassy waitress Flo on the old sitcom "Alice" used to tell people to kiss her what?(And keep in mind the answer is not a dirty word — if you try to send me a message that has THAT word in it, our spam filters at work will probably block it, anyway.) I’ll pick one winner from the entries received by noon Friday, May 18.UPDATE: Congratulations to Wanda Gunn of Scottsdale, whose name was drawn from the entries with the correct word, which was "grits."

ANTM 8.10: Oh, HAYL no.

May 9th, 2007, 8:12 pm by Sam Mittelsteadt

And with one fell swoop, all the delight of watching "America’s Next Top Model" has been eliminated. I mean, I knew DIONNE was on her way out soon — she’d gotten the "needs too much coaching" edit last week with the subtlety of a sledgehammer — but still, couldn’t she have stayed on one more week until the finale? If anything, I needed her for lines like, "I’m just gonna take my ass to sleep." (Ah, a girl after my own heart.)And Tyra telling Natasha that the competition "is not about doing one bad photo shoot and going home"? Uh, in case she hadn’t paid attention to ANY EPISODE IN THE PAST, that’s exactly what this program is about most weeks. The girl with the weakest photo goes home. Samantha can’t get her porn on? Out. Kathleen can’t figure out what anti-fur means and it shows in her face? Gone. Felicia looks dead in a photo where she’s supposed to be dead? See ya.Now, the other girls’ reason for picking Natasha as the model with least potential was weak at best — a "fake" personality still gets you in the door (unlike Brittany’s no personality last week) and her pictures are among the strongest. So maybe it was jealousy, or maybe they just can’t understand how delusional Natasha really is. "I did a great job!" she says after her disastrous shoot this week. (How can a woman who had dental work WITHOUT ANESTHESIA, then turned around and rocked a shoot, be felled by a head cold? She looked like a zombie.)Natasha is full-blown weird/crazy, as evidenced by her inability to pick up her cell phone while talking to her husband, instead preferring to nuzzle it while it lies on the edge of the bed and making sexy cooing noises and thankfully unintelligible gibberish. It’s moments like this I’m glad I don’t have closed-captioning. (Also, not taking that kind of schmoopy talk into another room? Annoying. It’s not like they’re stuck in a studio, and we all remember from the "lesbian" photo shoot how Dionne feels about showing affection…)The challenge involves the models telling their own story to aboriginal tribeswomen who are wearing black dresses with white handprints on them. I guess the story of that tribe is "men can’t keep their hands off us." Natasha wears her wedge heels into the bush even though, as Dionne puts it, "it is freaking raining, the wind is blowing extremely hard, and we are getting COLD." (This will come into play later, maybe.) The girls have 15 minutes to decorate themselves and their dresses and get ready for their Very Special Episodes about various life traumas through a dance in which they’ll be judged on "body art, movement and oral speech."In order: Renee was abused, has four sisters, strength, women unified, blah blah blah. She does not mention living in a car, probably because it would garner her no points with this crowd. Jaslene was once a young girl "who was misled into pain, agony and suffering" (is she Jaslene Christ?) but through true love she is so happy, "all I do is live, love and laugh." This sounds like a bad one-woman show. There is a long pause before there’s any clapping.Dionne says, "I don’t wanna do no dance. Tell what story? I do not want to dance, period. … I don’t feel like that’s relevant." Tell us how you really feel! However, she goes out and talks about her mother’s shooting and paralysis, and her sisters and kids, and does a pretty good job, although she and Jaslene could use a little help remembering the "movement" part of the challenge. It’s like they’re giving a PowerPoint presentation.Then here comes Natasha, who’s all sweeping the ground with branches and twigs, and has decided to speak very quietly so people pay attention. At first I thought it was because she was ramping up for big drama — OK, so maybe I’ve got too many disco diva songs on my iPod — but no, she spends the whole time talking barely above a whisper, which earns a hearty "What the HAYL?" from Dionne. (Yay!) I second that what the hayl, because when I can understand what she’s saying, she is saying, "I’m going to the forest, I listen to the trees…" It is nonsensical, like much of her English, and at the end she says, "My dance was really good because I use the tree branches and I am barefoot like the girls who performed before us."

This makes me very excited to hear next week’s My Life as a Cover Girl auditions. Very, VERY excited. Guest judge Carissa Rosenberg of Seventeen magazine picks Renee — who is still going by Nene, maybe to curry extra aboriginal favor? — because she feels like the Seventeen readers would care about her and want to hear what she has to say. Uh, what happened to "body art, movement and oral speech"? Eh, hers was probably the best of the four anyway.And now for the exaggeration of the week: Carissa also says that Seventeen has 13 million readers. Now, according to the Magazine Publishers of America, in 2006 Seventeen had 2.01 million paid and verified subscriptions and single-copy sales. So unless each issue is being shared by more than six girls, I’m saying her pants, although fashionable, are on fire.FYI, that number is lower than Good Housekeeping (4.6 million), Ladies Home Journal (4.1 million), Family Circle and Women’s Day (both just over 4 million), Cosmopolitan (2.9 million), Southern Living, Redbook and Glamour. … but well above Vogue, which clocks in at #72 with just under 1.3 million.Anyway, Renee and Jaslene win some South Sea pearls from a guy who looks like a butler but is actually an executive at Autore Pearls. "This jullery is stunning," Jaslene says as she fondles her earrings and bracelet. So much better to be picked as the friend of the jewelry-challenge winner than as the actual winner of a photo-shoot-on-top-of-a-bridge challenge!"I am at the point I really want to have some fun," says Dionne (whom I shall quote as much as possible this week, since it’ll be my — sob — last time). They decide to go out, Renee and Jaslene all julleried up. But Natasha, who has developed some sort of cold or flu, is staying in. That’s what you get for wearing open-toed shoes out of season! Also, Renee explains how Vicks Vapo-Rub works to Natasha. I love the Vapo-Rub. In fact, one of my aromatherapy oils is camphor. Sometimes I dab it on right before bedtime just because it helps me go to sleep.The girls rip the absent Natasha apart. "She was a funny Russian girl, but now she’s annoying to me," says Jaslene. "She got some lies floating around somewhere," says Dionne. They are grown-up Mean Girls now.Natasha, in her delusional way, says, "I’m in every conversation" (which in this case is true) but says it would distract her "from the competition to let these girls get in my head."The next day, it’s back to the cold, rainy bush for a photo shoot in which the models must act out an aboriginal story in the photo. "Isn’t that really cool?" Jay Manuel prompts, and the response is underwhelming. Dionne’s reaction was to think: "Do we have to dance again? And I’ll be damned. We have to dance. Again." God, how I’m going to miss this girl!Luckily the dances are minimal, since these are after all still photos. Jaslene is first and gets raves for an interpretation that is "beautiful and graceful." I love how all the aboriginal women in the photo at right are giving "jazz hands."Dionne’s shoot is frustrating for Jay because he has to direct her so much, frustrating for Dionne because she can’t figure out how to change what he’s asking her to change, and frustrating for me because I can see how this episode is going to end. The photo below pretty much sums it up: She looks like she’s trying to copy him but just can’t get it right — the legs, the left arm, so close but not quite…. Natasha’s shoot, though, gives me hope: It’s AWFUL. She has weird slashes on her stomach that make her look bloated, and she is so horrible it makes me suspect one of the other girls slipped her some cold medicine. And maybe a shot or two. It’s that bad. Jay stops the shoot not once but twice to tell her to work through it.Renee sounds kind of stuffed up in her interviews, too. She does well on her shoot. Has anyone noticed she’s getting all the "man, this stuff is great!" interviews? She’s savvy, that one.Judging! Tyra’s photos have her with a boomerang. There is no dancing, but we cut to her with that weird hand-on-hip pose as she leads the girls in and goes through the motions of everything. Dionne is first and they say it’s a good photo but eye contact is lacking, and the whole "needing direction" thing is brought up again. And then they spring the "evaluate your competition" gambit on the girls: By knowing their strengths and weaknesses, that’s how you get ahead, Tyra says. Uh, wha? … Dionne picks Jaslene as the girl with the most potential — oh, Dionne, have you learned nothing from previous cycles? — and says she doesn’t believe Natasha and her personality.Nigel tells Jaslene "this is a face of yours I’ve seen a lot," which, duh. She picks herself as the girl with most potential, mostly because of drive. She says she likes Natasha but she comes off "real phony."Renee had the most poses. "Family is the fire under my butt," she says as she picks herself for the girl with most potential, and says something’s lacking and fake in Natasha’s personality department.Natasha’s photo is rightfully criticized as bad, and Tyra calls it worse than the first photo shoot. She picks herself as the girl with the most potential because she has the Eastern European features that are in fashion, which, OK, give her points for knowing that. We never hear who she would pick as the one with least potential, although she says that "if Gisele Bundchen were behind me, I’d say she had the least potential because she’s the biggest competition." Maybe the other girls are jealous because she takes good pictures? And then she says something awesome: "It’s better to be talked about than to be not noticeable." In your face, Mean Girls!While the judges deliberate, Natasha tries to talk to the other girls, saying she doesn’t understand why they feel that way. Jaslene is the only one who’ll talk, saying that she’s not jealous and doesn’t see Natasha as competition, which is kind of deluded in its own way, considering how many times Natasha has won — including that interview challenge, where you’d think that Natasha Fatale accent would have ruined her.They say Jaslene is giving the "same look," even if it is a fierce one, and Dionne gets criticized for being the only girl who didn’t pick herself as the one with the most potential. Nigel says Renee is "not the youngest, freshest face on the block," and they’re boggled about why everyone hates Natasha, whom Twiggy lauds for dealing with the gang-hate "miraculously."Renee gets called first, then Jaslene. Will Dionne and Natasha please step forward? Dionne started out rough and got better, but her progress hasn’t been great. "If your path is rocky and you don’t believe in yourself, who will?" Tyra asks. Natasha, your photo shoot was dreadful and this sick thing is the oldest Top Model story and we are over it.Psyche! Not really. They think the girls are just jealous. "This competition is not about doing one bad photo shoot and going home," Tyra says, so they looked at the body of work instead. Natasha goes to hug Dionne, who won’t even give her some goodbye love. In fact, she looks like she might punch someone. Please let it be Tyra, while Tyra keeps that annoying pep talk/lecture crap going. "We gave you all the goods," Tyra says, and then I realized there weren’t going to be fisticuffs so I stopped listening. Seriously, how awesome would it be if Dionne just popped her in the face?As Dionne packs, things are just falling off the hangers onto the floor of the closet. "I’m very proud of myself," she says. And so I am! In fact, if she doesn’t have a career in modeling, I might just have to move to Montgomery, Ala., just so she can work on my teeth.

Isabella Blow dead at 48

May 8th, 2007, 11:15 pm by Sam Mittelsteadt

Mostly known as London milliner Phillip Treacy’s muse, stylist Isabella Blow died Monday of cancer, although some Web sites are already wondering if the official cause of death is covering up a suicide, given a history of attempts.The New York Daily News rounds them up, including this tidbit: "In 2005, she tried to kill herself by jumping off a London bridge. After breaking her feet and no longer being able to wear any of her 280 pairs of spiked heels, she was inundated by gifts of flat shoes from designers including Manolo Blahnik and Christian Laboutin. Fellow style icon Victoria Beckham, on hearing of the 2005 suicide attempt, famously declared: "What genius!"The Daily Mail has a slightly kinder send-off (including the photo above). The anecdotes make it entertaining reading, starting with the lead:– "An infant brother drowned in the family pool. A husband who ran off with a lesbian. A louche grandfather destroyed by scandal. Under those outrageous hats, fashion icon Isabella Blow hid many tragedies. But she saved the greatest till last …"– "She launched the careers of upperclass models Stella Tennant, Honor Fraser and Iris Palmer, and Sophie Dahl, whom she described as ‘a blow-up doll with brains.’ Infamously, she first encountered the then voluptuous Dahl weeping on the street after an argument with her mother, marched her off to a fashion agency and cast her in a fashion shoot at a time when only stick-thin models were getting work." (I remember Dahl mostly for this YSL perfume ad that was too scandalous to stay in print long.)– "Young girls in Isabella’s orbit were so terrified of her that as soon as they heard her voice echoing down a corridor, followed inevitably by a waft of her overpowering perfume, they would rush to exchange their comfortable pumps for teetering heels, not wishing to be found stylistically wanting. Above all, they would reach desperately for their lipstick. ‘If you don’t wear lipstick I can’t talk to you,’ came their mentor’s booming advice. "You need to have lips. They are very important for getting men.’ "And as an aside, another item in the Daily News post suggests that actors/daters Kate Hudson and Owen Wilson got the brushoff at Tom Ford’s new store. Yes, pulling an Oprah-in-Hermes is the best way to get good word of mouth for a store!

Ego and attitudes at Ford store?

May 7th, 2007, 9:33 pm by Sam Mittelsteadt

Uh, how surprising would it be if I told you that a store where the cheapest thing was $75 (a pair of socks) and shoes went for five-digit figures might have a little bit of an attitude in the staff? (The picture above is of the store’s "fragrance chamber," where scents go for $165 to $430.)

A few weeks ago we published this article about designer Tom Ford’s new menswear store in New York, and any store that keeps its clothing in hard-to-reach glass cases is clearly not going for the customer-friendly experience.

I used to have a little thing for Gucci-era Tom Ford, although less about the brand itself than about the turnaround he did on the clothing line — beginning with his 1995 debut that included the velvet hip-huggers at left, which Madonna wore that year to the MTV awards where she had the memorable run-in with Courtney Love. However, the man himself — well, I guess you have to have a sizeable self-worth to survive the scathing reviews of the fashion world, but there’s a fine line between self-worth and ego.And along the way it seems he started putting together ever-more-fantastical scenarios with himself as the star — and his acolytes kept letting him. He cast himself as the star in a W magazine spread (not safe for work) where’s he’s buffing male models’ buttocks and making out with mannequins, and tried to rationalize it in the accompanying interview by saying he’s striking out against a plastic version of beauty … while still looking pretty plastic and beautiful himself.Vanity Fair — always the arbiter of subtlety — let him guest-edit their Hollywood issue. Maybe you remember it? One actress refused to pose nude, the two who did on the cover look horrible and who’s front and center? Tom Ford, in a creepy nuzzle/sniff with Keira Knightley. (And just in case you missed it, the issue is titled "Tom Ford’s Hollywood.")So, why is it that the New York Times thought the store would actually be friendly? I won’t even set foot in the Gucci store in Scottsdale Fashion Square for fear the laser burns of the staff will reduce me to a pile of ash, so I can’t imagine why the Ford store would be any different.But a Times writer who decided to pay a visit learned what most people already figured out: High-end stores are often — I won’t say "rude," but let’s settle on "significantly less friendly" — to customers who don’t look and act like they’re loaded or connected. (When he’s told he can’t go upstairs because it’s appointment-only and asks to make an appointment, the guard says of the store manager, "Let me see if he has the time for you."When Horatio Silva writes, "When I heard that Mr. Ford had appointed an in-store maid … (T)he last thing I expected was a display of help-as-spectacle." Really? Had he not done his research? Was he just struck simple-minded that day? Because that’s the first thing I would have expected from someone who earlier "apparently melted at the sight of his butler using a Bunsen burner to warm shoeshine wax" (from the same article). It’s over-the-top affectation.I wonder if Silva wrote such a huffy article because he wasn’t immediately recognized and given the glorious treatment he expected — he makes a point of telling us he attended a party there a few days earlier, and also makes a point of going back to contrast his initial brushoff with the treatment he received once the staff knew he worked at the Times.This just in: Places that sell $4,000 men’s dressing gowns and trousers that unbutton at the cuff so your butler can whisk away the day’s detritus have snobby help! Duh. Why would you expect anything less?

Nasty feet.

May 7th, 2007, 5:03 pm by Sam Mittelsteadt

Just around the time that I think people have learned to keep their nasty feet under wraps until they’ve been cleaned up, something like this shows up.

Seriously, are those even human? Granted, it’s a promotion for foot care products, but one look at those heels really makes me queasy. And I’ve been slavishly applying lotion at night, just in case.

Quad City Models

May 6th, 2007, 12:41 pm by Sam Mittelsteadt

So, I can’t quite figure out if this Web site I wandered across is a hoax, or just very, very sad.Photos like this would scare

me away from a photographer, not make me sign up for portraits.

And beyond that … these people are hoping to be professional models. Sure, living near Scottsdale has influenced my sense as to what’s attractive. But even back when I lived in a Montana town with a population of 8,000, I would have never looked at anyone on this site and thought: "Now, THEY should model."

ANTM 8.9: I get so emotional.

May 2nd, 2007, 8:10 pm by Sam Mittelsteadt

Ah, the go-sees, when there’s always one girl who doesn’t make it back on time. Only this year, there’s two — which is a theme, since the girls also shoot two photos this week, one in the style of a men’s magazine and one in the style of "man, Tyra shoots seriously amateur photos." But only Brittany goes home, although it’s because none of the designers wanted to book her, and less because she has the mouth of a Teamster*, as she ably demonstrates back at Priscilla Model Management. Loudly. So loudly it disrupts filming inside.(* I hasten to add my father was a Teamster.)Seriously: Tyra, put down the camera. We’re sick of your sepia-toned black and whites. At least this year you didn’t rely on visual gimmicks like crazy contacts or fake tears .. but then again, take away the gimmicks and your Calvin Clone tendencies become even more noticeable. And having a professional photographer shoot Part Two of the theme doesn’t help, either.OK, go-sees: Jodhi Meares, who replaced Erika as host of "Australia’s Next Top Model," shows up for 2.5 seconds at the Priscilla agency to tell them to make a good impression on the designers (along with Priscilla owner Priscilla Leighton Clark). I notice Jaslene looks really cute just then, with her hair pulled back. She’s back to fantasticurls for her interviews, where I think she says her goal is to be "calm, cool and collective." Or maybe her cha-cha accent got in the way of "collected."I had a mean Brittany joke when she was reading the Tyra Mail, and I was going to be all, "What?" like she didn’t remember — you know, short-term memory and all — but it turns out she does it so much better for herself. We’ll start with telling the cab driver to go to 13 Cook Road but badgering the building with 15-19 Cook Road instead. When she finally gets inside, she walks like a newborn fawn. I’m surprised she doesn’t crumple to the ground. Later, she nearly gets trapped in an elevator, and then when the doors close pushes the button for the third floor. But she’s already on the third floor. And also, she’s decided to clam up and not say anything to the designers, even though one of the three things the models are being judged on is personality.Awesome moment: One of the designers asks Natasha how tall she is — "5′9"?" — but rather than answer, she continues to stomp fiercely toward, then away from him. You know she just didn’t want to answer how short she really was. He’s all, "Hello?!" I can’t imagine that guy gave her good marks.Dionne shows her klepto tendencies: She asks to keep a swimsuit at one designer, then a shirt at the next, then shoes, then … everything. Perhaps because they’re on TV, most of the designers actually give them to her, whereas only the last set answers with, "You can BUY it…" I am surprised this didn’t get brought up at panel. You might be able to ask for something if you actually walk in a show or star in a shoot, but on a go-see?Jaslene and Renee do well. I think they might make the top two (although Renee’s edit tonight suggests to me she might end up in third place). Renee and Dionne are the first two back, and Jaslene shows up with a minute to spare. When Natasha shows up, Renee points out she’s late and Natasha, apparently trying to force time to bend to her will, says, "No, I’m not" like nobody will notice. Unfortunately, Priscilla and Jodhi do notice and disqualify her. She takes it relatively well.Brittany, not so much. "Congratulations, you three," Priscilla starts — for the second time — and up comes Brittany, who sees Natasha standing outside and shaking her head "no." This leads to tears, sobs and a lot of swear words. Really loud swear words: While they’re trying to film inside, her wailing and cursing is permeating the building. (Does Australia not insulate its windows very well, or is she just really loud?) Priscilla is getting perturbed and says, very understated, that "I assume she knows she’s been disqualified," since she hasn’t come inside.The designers’ takes: Renee’s got a great personality but photographs "hard." Dionne also gets personality marks but needs to work on her posture. Jaslene wins the challenge — she’s very excited about it. In fact, from the looks of her headlights she’s been excited ever since she got back from the go-sees, but hey. She picks Dionne to share in the challenge prize. (Which is to hike to the top of a 440-foot-tall bridge for a photo shoot with Nigel Barker. I would ask to trade with Whitney, who at least got jewelry. This shoot didn’t even have cool clothing — jumpsuits.)Outside, Natasha is all perky: "Can I hug the winner?" Brittany is bitter. And sobby.The next morning, the girls arrive on location at 5:30 a.m., and are told they’ll do two different shoots — one that would be suitable for a women’s magazine and another for a men’s magazine. "Women’s magazine": Are we talking Family Circle here? First For Women weekly? Because there’s a big difference between them and, say, Cosmopolitan, which I don’t think is very "soft and beautiful and fashion," but more: "BOOBS! Pushed up to your chin!" No artsy sepia-toned photos there. Anyway, Tyra’s one of the photographers.At one point, Tyra says in a child’s voice: "I made a pee-pee … I made a pee-pee, mommy" while pointing at her surf-soaked pants. And can I say: Ew.The men’s-style shoot is similarly lacking a certain something. Or should I say carrying a little extra baggage — mainly, guys. Has she ever looked at Maxim? Those girls are jugged out, sure, but there’s not a guy to be found in most shots. (No good-looking competition to get in the way of the reader’s fantasies, duh.) The pictures are way better, though.When the girls go home, Renee keeps her extensions in. Maybe Dionne is rubbing off on her: "Can I keep these?"At judging, Tyra’s spider eyelashes are back, and her hair is blessedly wrap-free (but a disconcertingly ashy light brown). Four of the five girls are wearing similar-style dresses, which makes me wonder if one of the designers kicked in some wardrobe. Natasha is of course wearing skinny jeans and heels.In 5 minutes, Tyra says "silky silky" (to Brittany) and "booty tooch" (to Renee). Look at what Fergie hath wrought. Natasha’s sexy shot looks awesome, as does Renee’s. Jaslene’s, eh. They praise her stuff to high heaven, though.During deliberations, they say Dionne’s photos are the weakest of the week, Natasha has a beautiful look and she wants to win, Jaslene proved she’s versatile, but although Brittany is photogenic, it’s the first time in "ANTM" history that not a single designer said they’d book her. Priscilla says Renee looks very "commercial" but when she saw her photos, "you could have knocked me down with a feather."Jaslene gets called first, then Natasha and Renee. And right about now is when red flags started going off for me. Remember when the designers said they preferred Renee’s softer photos? It’s the same old story: We don’t like THIS, change to THAT … but no, we’re going to disqualify you for being THAT instead of THIS.First they told Renee she photographed "hard" and "old," so she needed to soften up. She got kudos for doing so in the "poisoned" photo and she looked great during the commercial shoot, but now, after two weeks, they’re wondering if she’ll "always be a catalog girl?" and telling her she’s in danger because she’s "softer and sweeter … commercial and safe." Hey, I’ve seen the My Life As a Cover Girl ads for the past few years, and they’d be lucky if someone who’s commercial actually APPEARED in one.Red flag #2. They criticize Dionne for her hair. Which they gave her. They try to be all, "We asked her to change it up," but on the very week of makeovers they said Kelis/heavy bang/sassy look. You know, if you want to say "lousy pictures" and "needs too much direction," that’s fine, because her pictures this week really were pretty weak by comparison. But to start blaming her look and saying she’s "regressing," well … that blame goes right on who’s giving her the directions. For her look AND her photos.It’s down to Dionne and Brittany, and if you think that they’re going to keep a girl who made history — OK, just "Top Model" history, but still — you’re as crazy as Brittany is when she says "I’ve never been an emotional person." Sob, sob.Next week: While the aborigines wear flannel shirts, the Americans festoon themselves in tribal paint and do some sort of stupid thing that has nothing to do with modeling. Tea ceremony, anyone?

Gisele leaves Victoria’s Secret

May 2nd, 2007, 12:53 pm by Sam Mittelsteadt

Well, those rumors about Gisele Bundchen possibly being pregnant with Tom Brady’s baby aren’t going to die down now: On Tuesday, Victoria’s Secret announced it and the supermodel have parted ways.

Most internet speculation centers on Bundchen’s new affair with Brady, who’s already got one bun in the oven of model-turned-actress Bridget Moynihan.

I can’t imagine they fired her for her choice in boyfriend — after all, asking their models to prance around in push-up bras and garter sets isn’t exactly the act of a prudish and demure company.

And even if they did, how long could it be until she’s back in the company’s good graces? Advertisers dropped Kate Moss after photos of her doing blow showed up … but she was back in good graces within a few months.

Could it be? She might have even just quit because she’s tired of traipsing down runways in the same old angel wings and lingerie. … And in a blatant attempt to garner some web traffic, I now present a mini-gallery of Gisele in action on the runway.

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