The supermodel on Topshop, learning to code and the sample size debate

At an Amazonian 6ft 1in, 23-year-old American-by-way-of -St-Louis-Missouri, Karlie Kloss folds herself into the backseat of the car that will take her from her London hotel residence of less than 24 hours to her fitting for the outfit she will wear to Topshop Unique’s London Fashion Week show the next day. “Oh, there I am,” she exclaims cheerily in her mellifluous Midwestern sing-song accent as we pull up outside Topshop HQ, where a giant floor-to-ceiling billboard of her is facing the street.

In an industry that is notoriously fickle, and careers shortlived, with the majority of models coming and going in an anonymous abyss, Kloss has weathered an impressive eight-year stint, and become one of the world’s most highly paid, recognisable and bookable faces.

That she can do both edgy and girl-next-door helps. She recalls a fashion show season where “it was all about bleached eyebrows. I’d have them bleached in the morning, then drawn back, then bleached off again later. I remember going back to school with no eyebrows, and my friends were like, 'What parallel universe do you go to?’” Modelling, in some ways, requires a lack of vanity: “You have to be able to transform, let go a little bit, and be OK with that,” says Kloss.

“There are people who really like my walk, and others who think I look absolutely ridiculous”

Karlie Kloss

She is quite mesmerising in person, all golden skin tones and soft, green eyes, as well as being endearingly polite, eloquent and charming. For someone who’s starred in her friend Taylor Swift’s Bad Blood music video (and is a key member of the world’s most fawned-over “girl squad” with Kendall Jenner, Lena Dunham, Gigi Hadid and Swift) and swept down a Victoria’s Secret catwalk, she does not appear to have starlet-syndrome or even much of an ego.

She’s sharp and clever. As much as she talks of “the effortless cool” of English girls and Kate Moss, she is clued-up on the business side of the industry, and has as keen an interest in that as in the creative elements. “I’ve always had a very professional approach” she says.

She is shrewd on the value of her star reach, saying of her four-million strong Instagram following: “It’s part of what you have to bring to a brand. It’s added layers to the job title and what it means to be a model.”

You don’t, however, get to be name-dropped as a supermodel without fostering a style-signature. For Kloss, this is her prowling, balletic (eight years of lessons as a child) runway walk. “There are people who really like my walk, and others who think I look absolutely ridiculous. In my mind I’m doing the same thing as the other girls: look focused, look at the end of the runway, put your shoulders back, stand up tall, be confident,” she laughs. “Sometimes it works for me, sometimes it works against me.”

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As the star of its latest advertising campaign, her image is currently being beamed out of every Topshop store and bus stop near you, as well as online (naturally). She has now ascended to the status where she can watch a fashion show from the front row with her fellow A-listers, rather than doing the hard work of schlepping down the catwalk.

At Sunday’s Unique show, she giggled next to her British best friend and fellow mega-model, Jourdan Dunn, who she met, fittingly, on her first significant campaign shoot for the high street label at the start of her career. “I kind of watched what Jourdan was doing and thought, 'OK, I’ll do the same’,” she says.

From this, her career sky-rocketed, and there is barely a brand whose show she hasn’t walked in: Calvin Klein, Dior, Chanel, Givenchy, Marc Jacobs, Louis Vuitton, Alexander McQueen... As well as having fronted coveted campaign slots for DVF, Oscar de la Renta, Versace and L’Oréal, to name but a few.

“I’ve had to learn how to transition from being a 15 year old girl who was super tall and slim and ate candy and pizza for breakfast, lunch and dinner, to when, my body started to change and I had to completely re-learn how to think about food and exercise”

Karlie Kloss

The fashion world is currently reeling from – and catching up with – the rampant demands of an online world. Does Kloss think that magazines, whose circulations are dwarfed by her and her friends’ number of Instagram followers, are still relevant? She nods her head. “Absolutely. When you work with magazines, you create images which aren’t for campaigns, you don’t have to hold a bag a certain way to sell it. It’s about an idea. It’s in the vein of creating art. I don’t think magazines or runway shows are going to disappear, but the way people absorb media and communicate has changed.”

What hasn’t changed, however, is the scrutiny that the women in her industry are under. “I’ve had to learn how to transition from being a 15-year-old girl who was super tall and slim and ate candy and pizza for breakfast, lunch and dinner, to when my body started to change and I had to completely relearn how to think about food and exercise,” she says. “There’s pressure to be a certain shape or size because the clothing is a certain shape or size. As a model, you want to be booked in the show or in the campaign, so you have to fit the clothing. I’m always very supportive of the conversation around rethinking sample sizes. I’m taller than all of my peers, my body is just different from everybody else’s to start with, so the idea of having one-size-fits-all that everybody needs to shape themselves to fit is not realistic.”

Alongside modelling, Kloss has impressed with her extra-curricular activities: in 2012, she launched her Klossies cookies with hip New York City bakery Momofuko, which raises money for the Feed charity.

She is currently studying computer science and coding as an undergraduate at NYU. She has set up a related scholarship fund (Kode with Karlie) for underprivileged young women, and has her own YouTube channel (Klossy).

She’s impressively hard-working, and says – leaning over to give me a jar of Klossies – “I don’t like taking it easy. I aspire to build a business, and fill my days with lots of projects and philanthropy.” Will she always keep a hand in the modelling world? “I hope to have at least a foot in the door, for as long as they’ll have my big ol’ feet.” One can’t imagine Topshop is going to push her off the front row anytime soon.

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