There was no common thread in Kate Moss’ career. At most a few white lines. But these have now disappeared and finally nothing distracts us when the supermodel captivates us with her new campaigns.
Moss is sober. So ends the Wikipedia entry for the English supermodel. If this information is correct – and Wikipedia is often a toss of the coin – it is the temporarily tame happy ending to a career that sometimes reads like a police report. And indeed, the scandals with which Kate Moss is now making headlines are a size zero. Recently, she was caught carrying a Hermès bag as a beach bag. The queue for the Birkin bag screamed as if Kate was dangling a baby over the balcony railing. The days when the 51-year-old drenched her face in cocaine as if it were a chinchilla in a sand bath seem to be off the glass table for good. But the ambivalent ideal of beauty, which Kate made salon- and schoolroom-ready in the nineties, is currently experiencing a comeback. And unlike heroin chic, Ozempic glam can be injected with a doctor’s prescription.
Yet the turnaround that came with Kate’s rise to become the biggest supermodel of her generation was not a bad one at first. Cindy Crawford, Naomi Campbell, Linda Evangelista and Claudia Schiffer dominated the fashion industry’s ideal before Moss’ arrival on the catwalks: the definition of female perfection – if it were primarily debated by a room full of 15-year-old boys. But in 1988, when the brother of modeling agency owner Sarah Doukas approached 14-year-old Kate at New York airport and asked if she had ever considered modeling, a new era began. At 1.70 m tall, Moss is not only unusually small for the business. At the time, critics also criticized the position of her teeth and the fact that her eyes were supposedly too wide apart. But that was precisely what made Kate’s androgynous look so special and anyone who hadn’t yet understood that imperfection was now taking over the zeitgeist was left sitting on a pile of 90 60 90 sedcards. Grunge was now mainstream, Gen X gave artistic expression to their own lostness. And nobody looked more lost than this blonde Londoner, who was just a child a few months ago and was now thrown into the shark tank in a flowery bikini.
Chic and shock
“I’ve had to take my clothes off since I was 14,” Moss once said laconically. It didn’t sound like a denunciation. More like the punchline of a bitter, nasty joke. And perhaps that’s exactly what the fashion industry sometimes is, unfortunately. With jeans and underwear campaigns, the teenager initially became the figurehead of Calvin Klein. In 1993, her body finally became a political battleground. Photographer Corinne Day staged the then 19-year-old in her apartment for an issue of Vogue. With no make-up and ultra-thin, Kate Moss presented an image that parents see in their nightmares when their own children go to a party alone for the first time, where a hash cigarette could also be rolling. The heroin chic born of the photo shoot even occupied the White House in the months that followed. US President Bill Clinton expressed concern that such an aesthetic glorified drug use and death. How much we give a damn about Bill Clinton’s opinion on the well-being of young women can only be echoed by a grunt of laughter. But the negative impact on the body image of female teenagers in particular seemed clear.
Skinny Dip
The phenomenon was nothing new. In the sixties, Twiggy became the symbol of swinging London – and with her tomboyish looks, the antithesis of 50s vixens like Marilyn Monroe and Jayne Mansfield. Even then, there were voices of concern that Twiggy’s arms were literally as thin as twigs. With Kate Moss, the fashion world apparently launched a more raunchy update, as if on schedule, and turned the beauty ideals it had previously propagated for years on their head. “Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels”, Kate was quoted as saying. And delivered a mantra that put many of her fans in danger. Today, the model regrets the phrase. Unlike Twiggy, who always felt like she was surrounded by a flock of innocent cartoon birds, Kate Moss exuded a daring aura. The noughties brought the age of indie sleaze. And with it, the question of how much white powder fits into a pair of skinny jeans. Kate and a series of changing rock star boyfriends took up the challenge. Even shortly before meeting Nelson Mandela, the model is said to have slapped a line on the sink in his bathroom. But when celebrities sink into the drug swamp, they reappear in the headlines. The negative headlines cost the superstar engagements with brands such as Burberry, H&M and Chanel.
Subsidiaries
Kate Moss has long since recovered from these setbacks. In the years that followed, she increasingly focused on her own modeling agency, the Kate Moss Agency. Her most prominent protégé: daughter Lila Moss, who made her catwalk debut at a show for Miu Miu in 2021. In the meantime, the hourglass has turned again – after years of Kardashian curves and body positivity, social media is declaring a new drought of bodies. Kate Moss not only shaped the last one, she survived it. And is increasingly back in front of the camera for major brands – as a grand dame whose charisma is perhaps not overshadowed by escapades and debates for the first time in her career. Only her wellness brand Cosmoss filed for bankruptcy this spring. The brand sold products for a healthy and mindful everyday life. Kate Moss may be sober. But we’d rather get tips for a sensible life from someone else.
Kate Moss x Saint Laurent
Sorry Oasis and flip phones, our favorite comeback of the nineties goes to Kate Moss in 2025. After Versace and Isabel Marant, the Englishwoman can now also be seen in the new Saint Laurent campaign. Kate and Chloë Sevigny stage the fall collection by Creative Director Anthony Vaccarello in a melancholy world of images on the beach in Los Angeles. And one thing is still clear: not even the Pacific can hold a candle to these Forever Cool Kids.
Unfortunately, you can’t stalk Kate Moss on Instagram. But you can check her out in her new campaign for Saint Laurent.
Another icon whose career we look back on fondly is Nina Hagen. Find out why for yourself.
Photos: pa picture alliance (dpa), Launchmetrics SpotlightSM
