When your breasts are, potentially, more famous than you are, it begins a battle to become known for something more. Like actors trying to break out of typecasts, a model who rockets to fame after garnering attention in Sports Illustrated has something of a mould-breaking job ahead of them – if they want to make it in high fashion.
Or do they? We’ve already pondered before on Kate Upton’s boundary blurring, and she continues to cross over from lad’s mag pinup to fashion model (and back again) with what seems like remarkable ease. It’s unlikely she’ll ever be a wildly successful runway model, but editorially she’s making it onto plenty of pages.
One thing that seems apparent – from an outside, consumer view – is an easygoing willingness to be whatever the world wants her to be. In doing both sexily-styled shoots that play to her body, and shoots that essentially ignore it all together, she comes across as neither desperate to prove herself as more than a body nor concerned about showing it off too much. Perhaps there’s something likeable in that.
Two shoots, vasty different styling: top, Kate Upton stars in a sultry shoot by Yu Tsai for Contributor Magazine, decked out in leopard-print Guess by Marciano pieces and gold chains. Above, classically styled and elegant in a shoot by Elle Muliarchyk for the August 2012 issue of Interview Russia.