Thanks to Nadja Auermann, 23, models can all take a second helping. The vampy German mannequin gets credit from the fashion industry for turning the scrawny Kate Moss into yesterday's news. Just over a year ago, Nadja herself was doing the waif thing, unsuccessfully. With her freckled face and mousy hair, "I was tired of looking like a frail 12-year-old," she says. So she marched into the Paris salon of Julien d'Ys and "took a risk." A new palette of smoky eyeliner and crimson lipstick followed the platinum transformation. So did plenty of magazine covers and a reported five-figure catwalk fee. "When she made her hair white-blonde," noted designer Karl Lagerfeld, "she became like a woman from another planet."
Nadja's proportions are otherworldly. Most of her 5'll½" belong to her legs. She was dubbed der Starch (the stork) by classmates in West Berlin, where she lived with her banker parents and sister. By 1990, she had caught the eye of a modeling scout. Now, when not doing runway duty, she lives in Paris with her beau, a real estate agent.
Don't tell anyone, but Nadja weighs only 119 lbs. Still, "I have curves," she says. "I look strong, sexy and feminine."
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