Natalie Keyser stands tall
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October 19, 2009 • Savanna Jones
Filed under Featured, Features
Standing at 5’11” and a half (that half is very important), Natalie Keyser is not your average teen. While most teens spent their summer baby-sitting for the monsters next door or floating the Deschutes River, Keyser traveled around the world.
As a model she has been to incredible locales such as Milan, London, Paris, New York City, Switzerland and Wales.
Many people will never go to one of these cities in their lifetime, but Keyser has already visited all of them—and she is only 17.
Although Keyser has had many amazing experiences and lived the high life, so to speak, she remains grounded and noticeably humble, even when she talks about the modeling world.
When asked of her life away from high school and Bend, her face lit up and she gushed over the experiences from her travels around the globe.
She mused over her other life; a life so drastically different from the one she leads in small town Bend.
Keyser spent six months in New York last year and attended summer school to make up her credits. She said that Summit is “really flexible” with her situation, which makes it easier to balance her modeling and student life.
Her modeling career started in a comically unlikely place. She was 12-years-old and attending a—shout out to all the nineties kids—Backstreet Boys concert when a modeling scout approached her.
“I thought it was a joke at first, but then they kept pursuing me,” she said.
At a casting call in Portland where 100 girls tried out, she was one of three chosen for agency representation.
She later signed with Pulse Management, a modeling agency that works closely with Elite Model Management based in New York City.
Elite represents supermodels such as Iman, Gisele Bündchen, Naomi Campbell and “America’s Next Top Model” winner CariDee English.
Keyser said that she would love to meet Tyra Banks.
“She was at the agency twice but I missed her,” Keyser said. “Some of the girls have met her and said she is really down to earth.”
Although Pulse Management primarily represents Keyser, (she calls it her “mother agency”), she is also represented by five other agencies around the world.
The most frenzied and stressful time for models is during fashion week at Bryant Park in Manhattan.
“It’s crazy backstage,” she said. “We have to show up at three o’clock even though the show starts at seven. It takes a long time because all the girls have to do hair and make up and then we have to practice our walks on the runway.”
She laughed and said, “Sometimes the shoes don’t fit and they have to use shoe horns.”
Keyser has modeled for Nina Ricci, one of the bigger designers, and has been in Elle magazine as well as the English magazine Dealer.
Though Keyser lives an exciting life, she said it is not all play—it is hard work.
She said that all of the girls must develop a healthy routine of going to the grocery store after work, eating and making sure they get enough sleep.
About the modeling rumors of eating disorders she said, “All the models eat.”
“I’ve never met a girl that is anorexic or bulimic,” she said. She did point out that the girls have trainers to trim of any weight, but that all the weight loss is done under healthy circumstances.
Still, models cannot eat whatever they like. She said that once, a girl made brownies and the agency got mad. Models must watch what they eat and be careful because of weight and skin issues.
“All the girls have to always wear high heels,” she said, “unless you’re 5’11” or taller.”
Of course, Keyser has met the rude girls who look her up and down. But overall, she says that her experiences with other models are positive.
“I stayed in an apartment that had fifteen girls, four per room, and two bathrooms and there were no problems,” she said.
Natalie described the casting process as “exhausting.” Sometimes she has to go to 20 castings, each of which usually takes an hour, in one day. She does not always get to every single one.
“New York and Paris are really easy to get around,” Keyser said. “London is hard, some of the castings can be six miles away from each other.”
Her favorite part of modeling is traveling and being photographed. “I really like being in front of the camera during an editorial,” she said.
One would assume she would be bored coming back to Bend, but she smiled and said that no, she enjoys it here. She now focuses on school and friends instead of her hectic modeling schedule mixed in with stressful casting calls and homework.
If her modeling career continues she would like to move to New York. If not, she said she would like to go to college and “just see what happens.”
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