A lil bit of Heidi Klum

Pratade precis med Kaytan, so kollar på Project Runway och då tänkte jag att jag hade jue faktiskt en intervju på lager :)

FROM VICTORIA’S SECRET VIXEN and Sports Illustrated cover gal to entrepreneur, reality-TV pioneer and mom, Heidi Klum has the Midas touch. Her fashion-competition series, Project Runway—is one of the genre’s most influential success stories and has spawned a companion series, the upcoming Models of the Runway. And though Project Runway’s leap from Bravo, its original cable home, to Lifetime was bumpy—complete with a highly publicized legal battle—it has finally returned to the small screen. The show doesn’t only have a new network, it also has a new backdrop: This season, the hit show is based in LA. And this reality juggernaut shows no signs of slowing down.

Add to that her own line of beauty products (In an Instant), various design projects and endorsements, movie and TV guest spots and a hosting gig on Germany’s Next Top Model by Heidi Klum, and you’ve got one busy renaissance woman. Oh yes, there’s also a sexy TeNeues coffee-table book called Rankin’s Heidilicious and a Heidi Barbie coming out, too. Despite everything going on in Klum’s hectic life, her family always has and always will come first.

We can all breathe a sigh of relief because Project Runway is back.
HEIDI KLUM: It was quite a wait. We’re all very excited! It was annoying.

It’s nice for people to finally see season six, which was filmed in LA for the first time.
It is! The contestants worked really hard. I like all the people who come on the show, and I really empathize with them. They’re with us five to six weeks—including all those people who get my auf Wiedersehen early on. When they get voted off I feel for them even more, because they can’t be on the show and they can’t go home.

It seems like everyone involved with Project Runway has to be very committed.
Season7, which airs in January, filmed in New York for six weeks, so I had to move my whole family back to the East Coast. But while the contestants are sewing, I am off. I’ll be with my kids on the top of some double-decker bus thinking, Those people are still at Parsons!

So season 6 is in LA, season 7 is in New York, and season 8 will be back in LA?
Right. The great thing about shooting in LA is that we get more big-time celebrities on the show. Our designers get so hyped up when we bring out these international superstars.

Are you happy with the show’s new home at Lifetime?
It’s been great. They really wanted Project Runway to come on, and the lawsuit put a downer on things for a second, but they’re excited to have us. They’re very accommodating, particularly where food is concerned [laughs]. Food is so important when you’re on a set. People are working from seven in the morning to nine or 10 at night, so it makes a huge difference if there’s random mush or something really great. Maybe because I was pregnant, they always had doughnuts.

So tell us about the new show, Models of the Runway.
The models are a big part of the show, yet they’ve been neglected. They live together in a model apartment, and it shows the process of them being the designers’ muses, not wanting to get kicked off, talking, living—we capture it all.

Why are people so fascinated with models?
I think it’s like a dream world where you have these gorgeous girls, but they’re all just people at the end of the day. Models of the Runway is for people who want to know more about how Project Runway is run.

Was there a risk involved in moving the show to LA?
People will ask us, “Why LA? LA isn’t a fashion capital.” But if you look at the history of American fashion, it started in Hollywood with designers making gowns for all the starlets. Sometimes I joke with Tim [Gunn] that we should do Project Runway on an island. “Here’s 15 minutes, now go into the bushes and find whatever you can and make an outfit.” I picture Michael [Kors] and me, super tan in our director’s chairs and me in a bikini saying, “Welcome to the runway!”

Are you excited about your Emmy nominations?
Definitely! I was nominated last year [for Best Reality Host], and the five of us from that category hosted the awards. Man, we got so beaten over the head for that! It’s not like the four boys and. You get hired to do it, they give you a script and you learn your lines. If I could have, I would have done the whole thing in German, with subtitles—everyone in dirndls and on swings and milking cows. Each nominee would have had to ride in on a big cow and milk it.

Are you eager to win, or is it really an honor just to be nominated?
At the end of the day, it really is great to be nominated. Out of all these hundreds of TV channels, only a handful of people are chosen. Then again, it would be nice to put an Emmy next to my husband’s MTV Video Music Award and many Grammys.

In other exciting news, your new coffee-table book, Rankin’s Heidilicious.
It’s very naughty. I’ve been shooting with this photographer, Rankin, for seven years, and working with him is fun because he always makes me look different. And he always gets me to take my clothes off for some reason. We’ll do some job, and then he’ll say, “Why don’t we shoot some more things,” and I’ll wind up without anything on.

On top of that, you have a new Barbie?
Yes! It’s part of Mattel’s Blonde Ambition series. The first one is Marilyn Monroe, the second is Goldie Hawn and the third is me! They said, “We want you to be part of this.” And I thought, Wow! Growing up with Barbie, it’s a dream to get my own. I got to go to Mattel and look through the heads and hair and outfits. I wanted it to be my daughter’s favorite, so I’m wearing the glitziest pink minidress in the world. And it always bothered me that Barbie was naked, so mine has on this cute pink bra and panties.

xoxo,
Vicky