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PHOTO COURTESY: VOGUE INDIA

DIVA’S SECRET Lakshmi Menon: ‘I’ve never made an effort to look thin. My genetic pool is skinny’

Bangalore girl Lakshmi Menon (if we can still claim her despite the city’s traffic and better air connections sending her off to Goa) comes blessed with all the traditional south Indian good looks. Her tall lanky frame perhaps sets her apart from that archetype.

This season is at Lakshmi’s feet. Vogue India’s April issue hits the stands with Lakshmi on the cover page. Iridescent bikini, oh-so-long faux ponytail, retro shades, a dash of colourful glass bangles and all, Lakshmi is the sultry beach goddess who’s risen from the seas off Thailand’s Koh Kood Island and into lensman Prabuddha Dasgupta’s view for the “Summer High” feature of the magazine. The new face of Hermes, the legendary century-old Parisian fashion house, Lakshmi also features in a series of ad campaigns for Hermes with, what else, but elephants, with paint all over them, even toe-nails!

Hail the ever-exotic mythical Indian obsessed over in the wild, wild west. Lakshmi sighs as she admits: “Unfortunately yes! That’s the sad part that they want to keep the myth of India being the land of elephants, and colourful women with pots on their heads intact. They are not comfortable with the emerging new India…the multicultural and global India,” she says. “They’ve not come to terms with it yet…there’s still wonder in their eyes.”

But the 25-year-old doesn’t see herself in that mould. “I look at myself as any other model. But yes, sometimes I’m looked upon as an exotic thing that’s landed on their shores,” she says, before adding how there are many African-Americans and Brazilians on the ramp who make the same mark.

Having studied at Bangalore’s Jyothi Nivas College, she made a quiet entry on to the ramps of Paris. “When I started off in Paris, no one knew me. In fact no one would have heard of Hermes in India four years ago. But this year, they are opening in Delhi. Fashion houses have become a new thing in India and the doors have opened to big foreign labels. People are more aware today because of travelling and the Internet. There’s no privacy and mystery left anymore…” she trails off.

So is it a big thing being on Vogue’s cover? “I believe it is now, isn’t it? You tell me,” she laughs. “It’s considered the fashion bible by the urban Indian woman.” Ask her about the worst part of doing a swimsuit shoot and she says “You need to make sure your body is in good shape because it’s as good as wearing underwear…the whole politics of the body come into play. I’m comfortable with my body and how I look, which is why I’ll probably never make it in Bollywood,” she laughs.

But hasn’t she been under the scanner for being rather lean, after the fashion industry set certain standards for models after the ramp deaths? “My BMI is pretty decent. I’ve never made an effort to look thin. My genetic pool is skinny. When I’m hungry I eat in moderate quantities and work out. I do Pilates.”

There is a serious problem though in the industry abroad because the girls hired for ramp shows are 14 or 15 and their bodies are barely developed, she says. “They are bound to have thin body types but women who look at them are aspiring for it.”

While she was a reluctant entrant into the world of modelling, she says she had no real apprehensions about it. “My only concern was that people make a big deal of it, and about the glamour. But it’s a terribly lonely profession. It’s not really glamorous in the sense that you need a lot of patience, waiting for things to happen…for the hair to be done and the make up to be put on…for the ramp or a shoot. And the preparation can be tiresome.”

But Lakshmi says she’s quite happy doing what she’s doing, dividing her time between New York and Paris and doing international assignments. She loves travelling and isn’t complaining about the money either.

She’s finished her first season in New York and is returning for the haute couture season. Lakshmi’s just made a quiet trip to Bangalore to visit her parents and prefers to do the interview from Goa. “I shifted base over a year ago and have been on the road for the last two months. It was becoming difficult to live in a crowded city and do grocery shopping without being stuck in a traffic jam,” she says matter-of-factly.

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