Generation Next

Arina Yalaletdinova

Carolinny Mendonça

Valeria Erokhina

Catherine McNeil, Abbey-Lee Kershaw, Maxine Shiff, Valeriya Melnik, Arizona... all of them were among the most successful models from Next. Worldwide. There is no particular feature that links them each to the others yet we've got the feeling they're all following a certain vision. The same image, the same aesthetics. A strategy ? We'd almost say yes, there might a touch of strategy in Next latest faces to hit the top or at least to make a decent career. Nothing as striking or obvious as Supreme's "three of a kind" (see Daiane, Caroline and Carolina), no rush to some fancy hairdos and no enormous wave of eye-catching make-over. No, just a little feeling, a little thing that makes us think the strategy there is probably a subtle interpretation of a certain look. Like the exploration of the no-man's-land between high-fashion faces and commercial models. Reducing it to the max, to a small edge. Blurrying the borders. Sounds dangerous. And so challenging, finding girls that could have been mainstream but due to a few little things just don't. Or maybe girls that could look both, adding an extra touch of versatility and opening some broader horizons.
Pull the hair back and you can change a face, an expression, the whole vibe you get from a model. Pull Catherine McNeil's brown hair back, discover a very specific face shape and beautiful big ears. That's it. Catherine is neither a totally classic beauty nor she has the quirky appeal of a Daiane or an Anabela. She mixes both, can be as close as possible to one without completely loosing the other. Like on her Vogue Paris cover last year. Ninety percent of a sexy bunny vibe, ten percent of a strong, special-looking model. And an awesome result. Bringing some new troubles. Valeriya Melnik was already playing with the same codes a few seasons earlier and got a feature in Vogue Italia's yearly models supplement then a few jobs for various magazines, mostly with Greg Kadel. Maxine Schiff put it even at a higher level. Jaws, eyes, cheekbones. All in her is impressive. All is precise, in her very own way. She's striking, simply striking as you can imagine the word "striking". She's captivating, the kind of models you can't easily get your eyes off. Very special. But very good in both a dark, serious, even a bit trashy atmosphere as much as in a cocktail dress, during a couture show where all is glittering, all is luxury. Where all could be underground and, not or, where all could look mainstream. We bet she can give the best of herself in something that would be "just in between".
Latest rising star as Next is without any doubt the Aussie Abbey-Lee Kershaw. Everything has been written, everything has been said. Every positive and negative you can imagine. No wonder. Abbey-Lee is everything and the opposite. A little bit of a very gamine look, a tad of what we could brand as "girl-next-door-chic" and... look at her twice. Incredibly huge eyes - much expression in them - a fantastic profile, fabulous jaws and the list is long. She's actually almost weird looking, the good weird we love to find in models, the little thing that spices-up editorials and polaroids. For sure, we don't agree with everything going on with Abbey-Lee and like with McNeil before, we're fearing to see her sticking to one role only. As if the girl who arrived in fashion to blurry the lines would suddenly be surrounded by the same fences they were about to break. More than ever, we need some "characters" like Abbey-Lee building up some solid "coherent contradictions". The next step in the story of Next is called Arizona, a beautiful nickname for a girl that belongs even more to the previous definition. Strong features, again mixed to something more "easy" to understand, something very West Coast. Strong means, in her case, a darker side, not only in her thick eye-brows. All in the attitude. Uncanny. Not expected with her look. The shock between the "cool" look and her poses, even on polaroids creates a new opportunity to explore. Deeper. A brand new breach into which we want to rush. And discover more, go further, look to the future. And the future at Next takes it roots in that same breach, ready to fill the void. Girls like Anastasia Kuznetsova, Alisa Frolkina or even Natalia Zakharova aren't exacltly following the same scenario but aren't far either. If you check some of their newest additions names like Arina Yalaletdinova, Valeria Erokhina or Carolinny Mendonça (featured earlier on MNP) you'll have an exact idea of the way Next decided to explore.