#cycle14

Sigh

Raina is another girl with such an incredibly beautiful face. With her wolf eyes, Raina really left a massive impact on the show throughout Cycle 14. She took incredible beauty shots, regardless of whether the shoot was tailored for a more commercial, or high fashion beauty, and even when it took a more artistic twist. With her gorgeous bone structure, she always managed to convey such strength and power, assisted by its perfect symmetry, and stunning harsh angles and lines. Straight on was her strength, allowing us to fully appreciate her beauty. With a lesser model it may have been too difficult to work, but Raina never seemed to fail when it came to her face. It is hard to believe that Raina is a natural blonde, as the brunette mane works perfectly with her eyes and alabaster skin tone. Even if I always forget when considering the transformations on this show, Raina is another perfect example of a makeover taking a girl to another level. Every shot in her portfolio works as a beauty shot, with her body being the more problematic element, if there were any issues at all. She did have a blockier figure, but even that isn’t the worst. She still had the height, and it wasn’t that difficult for her to overcome, and even if the face was always the star, the body never really hindered her success. One sensational element is always more than enough to make up for another average one, and Raina is another great example of this.

As for the ones I properly disagree with, Ivana should have just kept her afro, it was gorgeous, and the tightening took her down a level in my opinion. I really don’t like Erin’s, it feels weak. I wanted to see bigger, and more crazy hair, proper curls rather than limp waves. Either that or something simple, like Krista had, just a simple slicked back ponytail. I would have given Brendi long hair, like she had in the promo. Maybe a dark brown, with caramel highlights, and waves. Something ultra feminine, that could be brought back to show her face, but softens her most of the time. I hate Sandra’s cut, I think she looks so much better with her long natural hair, I wouldn’t have done anything to her. Then finally for Christina…anything else. Literally anything else would have been better. Why that colour, and why so badly done. I think simple black weave would have been best, or maybe even like red hair.

Outside of that the main thing I always seem to misremember is a bunch of FCO. Like I was sure Alexandra got it for her beauty shot in Cycle 14, or Mike getting the FCO instead of Jourdan in the second photoshoot of Cycle 20.

Final Runway

I totally agree. The first call-outs for the frostbitten and futuristic shoots are both completely undoubted, she slayed everyone, and the hair flip deserved as she killed it with only 5 frames. Jourdan’s first one was not deserved, Krista’s are all contestable in my eyes, and Ann definitely didn’t deserve most of them. The only one I’d say was also deserved was Joanie, but it came right at the end, so it is no where near as impressive.

Hmm…I mean the top 4 are pretty clear: Toccara, Alexandra, Kasia and Khrys. Out of them Toccara and Alexandra would probably be 3rd and 4th: both excel in one area (personality and modelling respectively), whereas Kasia and Khrys tick both boxes for me. I think if I was forced to pick between them, it would be Khrys. She was just the sweetest person, and I adored watching her. Still absolutely bummed she wasn’t our second plus size winner.

Alexandra might have sort of fumbled her way overseas, but once she was there she certainly became a force to be reckoned with. Her shadow shot especially justified all the previous questionable decisions the judges had made, and proved she deserved to be there. All the elements have come together in this shot, and again I feel a lot of the props have to go to Tyra. She really does have such an eye for the details; the way the light is hitting Alexandra is perfection, and the beautiful background and the soft beige tones all match the pattern chosen excellently. All the external elements compliment Alexandra perfectly. Her bone structure looks incredible; it proves stark lines and definition isn’t necessary for a stunning beauty shot. The softness of her features is the element that makes this shot so breath-taking, as it contributes the emanating warmth of the photograph. I just struggle to see how anyone could dislike this photograph, and in the end I guess it just forms another example of when the judges criminally rob someone of first call-out purely to extend the narrative of the pre-selected winner.