Who finds "sexy fashion models" sexy?
This page examines the sexiness of some top-ranked “sexy” fashion models. For reasons explained shortly, the masculinity-femininity of physical appearance will be the main focus here. Readers not familiar with the subtlety of masculinity-femininity should go through the feminine vs. masculine page before proceeding.
As of October, 2005, Models.com had rank-ordered the top-25 sexy female models, based on prominence and impact factor, as follows: 1) Heidi Klum, 2) Gisele Bundchen, 3) Adriana Lima, 4) Tyra Banks, 5) Karolina Kurkova, 6) Alessandra Ambrosio, 7) Isabeli Fontana, 8) Yamila Diaz-Rahi, 9) Ana Beatriz Barros, 10) Natalia Vodianova, 11) Carolyn Murphy, 12) Naomi Campbell, 13) Noemie Lenoir, 14) Marisa Miller, 15) Fernanda Tavares, 16) Daria Werbowy, 17) Veronica Varekova, 18) Kate Moss, 19) Fernanda Motta, 20) Josie Moran, 21) Angela Lindvall, 22) Bridget Hall, 23) Brenda Costa, 24) Mallory of "MTV Real world” fame and 25) Carla Campbell.
The italicized names are those of women of non-European ancestry and/or women with substantial non-European admixture; these women are excluded from the discussion for three major reasons: 1) there is an overlap between trait variation related to ethnicity and trait variation related to masculinization-feminization, and an ethnicity confound will unnecessarily complicate analysis; 2) facial features across different populations can be markedly different, which prevents the application of exacting standards in comparing attractiveness/sex appeal and 3) the non-European ancestry of the women with italicized names is heterogeneous. Mallory of "MTV Real world” fame is clearly the odd entry since her inclusion is obviously a result of her fame, which is not due to her looks, whereas the other models are famous for their looks. Therefore, Mallory is not addressed on this page, but her looks are addressed elsewhere; see the addendum below.
"Sexy" fashion models ranked by models.com (Oct., 2005)
Some of the comments below will not be a pleasant read, but someone needs to say that the emperor has no clothes, and the comments have been provided reluctantly.
Click the images for larger versions.
1) Heidi Klum
Heidi Klum has a very masculine face.
From left to right: 1) Heidi Klum has breasts that are way out of proportion with the rest of her physique, and it is obvious that they are artifically augmented via breast implants; 2) Heidi Klum's broad shoulders, male-typical arm length and broad rib cage; 3) Heidi Klum's "sexy" backside! More on Ms. Klum here.
2) Gisele Carolina Nonnenmacher Bündchen
Whose idea of a sexy woman is this?
Even though Gisele Bundchen has attempted to surgically make her nose look less manly (rhinoplasty; nose job), if people didn’t know any better, she could easily be mistaken for an eunuch. Besides, if one were to remove the breast implants, Bundchen's physique would be closer to a boy’s than a woman’s.
Sexy physique, isn't it?
Backside, where hast thou gone?
See Gisele compared to more feminine women here.
With short hair and no make-up, Karolina Kurkova should not find it difficult to pass off as a man.
Is a top-ranked sexy physique supposed to look like this?
Behold the "sexy" buttocks of Karolina Kurkova...
See Karolina compared to more feminine women here.
6) Alessandra Ambrosio
With high cheekbones, facial narrowing, low-set brows and an angular jawline, the face of Alessandra Ambrosio is unambiguously masculinized.
The natural physique of Alessandra Ambrosio is flat-chested and boyish, although the breast implants add some fake femininity. More on Ms. Ambrosio here and here.
7) Isabeli Fontana
If one were to just observe the face of Isabeli Fontana, one could conclude that one were looking at a long-haired man with make-up.
In the picture on the left side below, it appears that Isabeli Fontana even has a moustache.
The pelvic region of Isabeli Fontana does not appear to be manly, but note her broad shoulders and long arms.
10) Natalia Vodianova
Gucci designer Tom Ford has called Natalia Vodianova the most beautiful girl in the world! One wonders why the "most beautiful girl in the world" looks like an adolescent boy? For those who do not know, Tom Ford is a homosexual. Note the masculine hairline of Natalia Vodianova; this type of hairline in a young woman suggests but does not guarantee elevated testosterone levels.
Sexiness personified!
11) Carolyn Murphy
The face of Carolyn Murphy is clearly masculinized.
Is a sexy physique in a woman supposed to be boyish?
Carolyn Murphy has an abnormally shaped lower leg structure, a mild structural deformity to be more precise, and although this does not pertain to masculinity-femininity, it certainly pertains to sexiness.
14) Marisa Miller
It is remarkable that a woman with the masculine-looking and rugged face of Marisa Miller is a top-ranked swimsuit model!
Marisa Miller has the most feminine physique that we have encountered so far. However, she has breast implants, somewhat broader shoulders and narrower hips than feminine women (usually not obvious in most pictures of her), and chances are that the prominence of her backside is more dependent on muscles than bone structure compared to normal, feminine women. Nevertheless, Marisa Miller’s physique is easily more feminine than most others' on this page.
16) Daria Werbowy
No comments are necessary about the sexiness of Daria Werbowy; more here.
17) Veronica Varekova
Veronica Varekova has a very masculine face.
If one were to search for pictures of Veronica Varekova, one would often come across pictures showing a feminine and attractive physique, strangely at odds with the gross masculinization of her face. However, it turns out that the feminine appearance of her physique has a lot to do with crafty posing and what almost certainly appear to be breast implants. In reality, she has broad shoulders and a masculine torso and her backside is flattened compared to normal, feminine women.
18) Kate Moss
Kate Moss has very rugged facial features.
Kate Moss is reputed to have a waif-like physique. However, as the pictures below reveal, her weight fluctuates depending on dieting and the extent to which she is doing drugs. A slender skeletal body-build in Kate Moss would be at odds with her robust facial skeleton, and careful examination reveals that her skeleton is robust and comprises of broad shoulders, a broad pelvis, large feet, etc. Chances are that if she were to stop doing drugs and eat in accordance with desire, her natural physique would be muscular and border on the overweight with respect to body fat.
19) Fernanda Motta
Woman or man with breast implants?
20) Josie Moran
The feminine appearance of Josie Moran makes her a way-out outlier in this group, and it is remarkable that she is even on this list!
21) Angela Lindvall
The developmental program of Angela Lindvall appears to be have been confused and not clear as to whether it wanted to program for a male or a female.
22) Bridget Hall
The uninitiated would find it difficult to believe that this woman is a swimsuit and lingerie model!
Addendum: Needless to add, but there are plenty of other women that have been promoted as “sexy” by the fashion world, and the looks of these women should be discussed also. Some of these women have been addressed elsewhere within this site: Rachel Hunter and Mallory Snyder (see here), Elle MacPherson, Rebecca Romijn and Eva Herzigova. More of these “sexy” women will be addressed later. Some people have assumed that the top-25 women not addressed here have been ignored because they disprove the point, but this is not true; see, for example, a discussion of the looks of Ana Beatriz Barros and Adriana Lima in the context of lingerie modeling.
Comment:
In 14 of the 15 women addressed above, gross masculinization is readily observed, and some of these top-ranked "sexy" women could be easily mistaken for eunuchs, male transvestites or male-to-female transsexuals if one didn’t know any better! The question is, who finds the women other than Josie Moran sexy to start with, let alone make a top-25 list?
The conventional understanding of sexy is sexually appealing. Since most people attracted to women are heterosexual men, top-ranked sexy women should be strongly sexually appealing to most heterosexual men. However, most men are lifetime-exclusive heterosexuals, i.e., people who have neither experienced same-sex attraction nor engaged in homosexual behavior in their lifetime, and the women above other than Josie Moran wouldn’t come anywhere close to making it in the top-25 list of sexy women as far as the vast majority of lifetime-exclusive heterosexual men are concerned. This conclusions is not changed even if we consider that too wide hips, too rounded hips and too large breasts look maternal and thereby less sexy than more moderate feminine development of these structures because a young nulliparous woman would generally be more sexually appealing than a mother.
A correlate of the sexiness of a woman to a heterosexual man is the ease with which he could obtain sexual favors from her without going through a lengthy courtship process and promising commitment; the greater the inferred ease based on physical appearance, then controlling for other factors, the sexier the woman. Women who convey the impression of being easier to bed tend to be somewhat masculinized, some examples of which can be seen here, but if they are to remain sexually appealing to lifetime-exclusive heterosexual men, then there is an upper limit to the extent of masculinization, and all of the women addressed above except Josie Moran exceed this limit as far as being top-ranked sexy women go.It has been shown that in the U.S., as well as a number of other Western nations, about 80% of men are lifetime-exclusive heterosexuals,(1) but upwards of 95% of men self-identify as heterosexual.(2) It has also been shown that individuals that have voluntarily engaged in homosexual behavior without experiencing same-sex attraction or experienced same-sex attraction without engaging in homosexual behavior are distinguished from lifetime-exclusive heterosexuals with respect to recalled sex-atypical childhood behavior and self-ascribed masculinity-femininity in adulthood, and in the same direction that distinguishes homosexuals from heterosexuals on these two counts, though to a lesser extent.(3) Additionally, taxonomical analyses of the distribution of same-sex and opposite-sex attractions have revealed a dichotomous categorization of the sexual orientations underlying such attractions, and these categories are best summed as heterosexual and nonheterosexual; the nonheterosexual group including self-identified heterosexuals that do not happen to be lifetime-exclusive heterosexuals.(4; also see the cluster analysis here)
Most men who would find the women other than Josie Moran above to be attractive enough to make the top-25 list of sexy women would come from the nonheterosexual category, and most of these men would be self-identified heterosexuals. Then, one should also consider the possibility that some lifetime-exclusive heterosexual men have narrowly escaped nonheterosexuality. For instance, I came across the profile of a man who worked as a hairstylist in New York City. The combination of his looks, his profession, place of residence and self-described heterosexuality appeared to be odd, and it prompted me to read more about him. Whereas I did not encounter any description of him having experienced homosexual interests in the past, he described how he met his first wife. It was love at first sight; he first noticed her from the back, and the very first thing that he described about her was her very small backside. This woman also happened to be tall and skinny, i.e., had the looks of a typical high-fashion model. Therefore, if this man is a lifetime-exclusive heterosexual, chances are that he escaped nonheterosexuality by a narrow margin.
Even if we lump all men who are not lifetime-exclusive heterosexuals with men who have narrowly escaped nonheterosexuality, this group will constitute a minority of men, and allowing for the fact that a small minority of the other group, the majority group, will have a preference for somewhat masculinized women and that a number of men belonging to the minority group will have a preference for feminine women, the weight of the preferences of men will at most result in only 3 of the 15 women above making it to a top-25 list of sexy women: Josie Moran; Marisa Miller, helped partly by her breast implants; and Veronica Varekova. As pointed above, the usually feminine-appearing physique of Veronica Varekova is a sleight of photography and what almost certainly appear to be breast implants, i.e., if we restrict the female preference evaluation to only men who are well-informed -- well-informed about tricks of photography and the range of attractive and feminine phenotypes among women -- then it is almost a guarantee that Veronica Varekova will not be making it to the top-25 list or even coming close and most likely Marisa Miller will not make it either, given gross masculinization and ruggedness in her facial features.
The ranking of the 15 women above in the “top-25 sexy women list” is based on prominence and impact factor and does not reflect the weight of the aesthetic preferences among men. The prominence of these women with the exception of Josie Moran clearly results from the homosexual domination of the fashion business, which should be obvious in that many of these women are tied to fashion modeling in some way. Models.com simultaneously maintains a list of top-25 sexy female models and top-50 fashion models, and as of October, 2005, most of the top-25 sexy female models are nowhere among the top-50 fashion models, undoubtedly because a number of the top-25 sexy female models are more feminine and older than what the male homosexual fashion designers would prefer their models to be. The one notable exception as of October, 2005, happens to be Daria Werbowy, who is ranked at #16 in the top-25 sexy list, #9 in the 15 women considered above and #1 in the top-50 fashion model list.
The reason why masculinity-femininity is focused upon here is because fashion models are generally not deficient with respect to sexiness-related aspects other than masculinity-femininity.
References:
- Sell, R. L., Wells, J. A., and Wypij, D., The prevalence of homosexual behavior and attraction in the United States, the United Kingdom and France: results of national population-based samples, Arch Sex Behav, 24, 235 (1995).
- Laumann, E. O., Gagnon, J. H., Michael, R. T., etc., The social organization of sexuality: sexual practices in the United States, University of Chicago Press, Chicago (1994).
- Dunne, M. P., Bailey, J. M., Kirk, K. M., and Martin, N. G., The subtlety of sex-atypicality, Arch Sex Behav, 29, 549 (2000).
- Gangestad, S. W., Bailey, J. M., and Martin, N. G., Taxometric analyses of sexual orientation and gender identity, J Pers Soc Psychol, 78, 1109 (2000).
Picture Credits:
Skins.be, Supermodels.nl, Perfect People, Sports illustrated magazine, Deardiary.