Heart and Soul, Gia Carangi

Last Thursday, I was on Facebook for whatever reason and an old friend from my Studio 54 days popped up to say hello. Kenny and I made a date for lunch in NYC in the near future and then I got a friend request from an unknown. When I went to her page, to my surprise, her profile pic was a photo of Gia that I had taken many years ago. I asked where she got it and she directed me to a site that had multiple pics that I had taken of Gia. One thing led to another, and I became a member of a site that honored Gia's memory, Hartandsoulgiacarangi/yahoogroups. I began to recognize past friends and in particular, the person responsible for the site, Sandra Linter, a world famous makeup artist that I revered during the 70's and 80's, so I joined in and started to tell my stories of those magical days. Here, for a while, I will share my communications with hartandsoulgiacorangi/yahoogroups.com:

For those that don't know, Gia Carangi was the "First Super Model". I had discovered her in 1976 and took her to Wilhelmina Cooper, the owner of Wilhelmina Model Agency in NYC, and she herself, a famous model in the 50's.


Another story that I want to tell is the story of taking Gia to Willy!


I had hired a makeup artist for my salon in Bala Cynwyd, PA in 1987. She was a gorgeous woman named Sandra. She was an amateur photographer too. We talked photography a lot and then she wanted to see my book. I showed it to her and she flipped over the pix of Gia. Sandy had been a Wilhelmina "beauty" model, (she was too short to be a model) so she knew Willy well. She asked me if she could show Willy the pix and I said yes. Willy wanted to see Gia, so Sandra and I arranged for Gia to meet us in New York and take her to Willy. Gia was wearing white boots and was dressed very nicely and had her mother with her when Sandra and I met in a coffee shop just down the street from the agency, which was on Madison Ave in the 30's at that time. We went to the agency, got off the elevator and were whisked quickly into Willy's office by Willy's assistant. Willy was very tall, dark hair pulled back but high, quite thin, and had no chin. I though how interesting that the camera didn't care that she didn't have a chin.


She was quite excited to meet Gia, calling her dear. She asked Gia how tall she was and Gia really didn't know, so she took her over to a door jam on the side of her office and had her stand up straight against the jam. Gia appeared to be just short of the required height. Willy shrugged and said "Oh well, just about 5' 7"!" Willy mentioned a contract, got on the phone with a photographer to set up a test and asked us to return the next week so that she could send Gia on tests and start a book. Then we left. We got to the bottom of the elevator and her assistant came running down the stairs. Willy was so excited with this treasure that she forgot to give her the contract. Boy did that woman know what she had in front of her that day!
Click here to see my photos of Gia.