Erika Linder: The Female/Male Model Chameleon
Erika Linder is a model who models women’s and men’s clothing. Her androgynous looks have landed her big contracts and have put her on the map as one of the most gender-bending models of all time.
Erika Linder was scouted at 14 outside a concert in Stockholm, Sweden. She declined the modelling scout’s offer and was very surprised the woman even asked her to model since in her mind, models were girly and didn’t look like her. She moved to Los Angeles at 21 and started modelling....male modelling. She was being booked for male modelling gigs because of her very androgynous looks. When she started modelling as a guy, it became headline news. People she worked with actually thought she was a man because she was booked in menswear campaigns and photo shoot but she was still very much a woman. “There was this photo shoot I did as a young Leonardo DiCaprio. To me, that was a fucking dream come true…my agency didn’t get it. They were like, ‘You're a girl you're not going to shoot as a guy, that’s so weird.’ I ended up just pushing for it myself…and then after that, that’s when the agencies in New York, London, Paris, and also other photographers started to see me”, Linder explains. That photoshoot really put her on the modelling map.
