Tiah Eckhardt, the new face of Eres lingerie

Back in January, frockwriter first mentioned that our well-placed sources had Australian model Tiah Eckhardt replacing Lara Stone as the new face of French luxury lingerie brand Eres. Last week we confirmed it. It's big news for Eckhardt because Eres is a high profile brand and, well, the incumbent is currently ranked the world number one on models.com. Below is the complete Fall/Winter 2010 2011 Eres lingerie campaign, shot by David Bellemere, which has just gone up on the Eres website (hat tip to Isaac for the headsup). Eckhardt shot the campaign in January, three months after giving birth to Finley Victoria, her daughter with model Patrick Delaney. Just three weeks after giving birth, she shot this Alex Goddard music clip.

Post baby body or not, the Eres campaign is a personal triumph - pardon the pun - for Eckhardt, who reports in a story written for Oyster magazine that when she first entered the modelling business, she was told her curves were not welcome.

Eckhardt recently republished the story on her blog, The Light of God and Girls:

"2010 made Australian Fashion Week the sixth I’ve participated in since my first in 2004. I’m not counting my unofficial first- 2002- where mid-high school year I ventured out of the comfort of my parents’ Perth home and across our great land just to be told I was too fat and, confusingly, too plain and too weird.


Thanks for the self-esteem boost guys, I also nearly failed school that year. My heart goes out to the little dolls I’ve seen at show castings ever since. The blisters from your baby-hooker shoes will heal but the ego-wounds won’t. I’ll give you the name of my therapist, say Tiah sent you. Oh… and I mean foot therapist, she does a great pedi. Don’t even bother with the other kind.


Just like that social-climbing bitch at school – yeah, you know the one: insecure and nerdy but desperate to hang out with ‘the cool kids’ – Australia’s fashion industry equivalents aren’t above cutting to the bone with the cheapest possible blow in order to assert themselves. As what one would wonder? A part of the international scene? Good luck. Just because you can bitch out on a chick for having tits and an arse as good as Karl Lagerfeld can doesn’t mean you can make clothes like him. And even it would seem The Kaiser’s coming around to a bit of woman’s-woman nowadays, booking the likes of Lara Stone and Claudia Schiffer for Chanel. Miuccia too, sending out Victoria’s Secret models for Prada and Marc Jacobs pulling a similar act with Elle MacPherson at Louis Vuitton.


Surprise! And not just at the international collections’ casting choices, but at the fact our country is still maintaining its tradition of not ‘getting it’ until two seasons too late. You’d think in 15 years we would’ve caught up. Or at least rebelled and begun a rebel faction in the cafeteria. But no no, as a collective we’re still chasing along after the popular kids, repeating what they do and what they say (but with delay) in a desperate bid to fit in most of the time. I look forward to 2012 when this year finally sets in and we see at least a C-cup on the runway, or anyone over 21".

Eres is Eckhardt's second inernational lingerie campaign, after Agent Provocateur in 2007. Her other international work includes campaigns for Iceberg, John Richmond, Westfield London and a profile in the December 2008 edition of French Playboy.

all images: patrick bellemere via eres

Tiah Eckhardt ties the knot, confirms Eres, auditions for X Men

tim bret-day for agent provocateur

Frockwriter must admit that we did a double take when we saw the shots rolling in of last night's Christian Dior Fall/Winter 2009/2010 haute couture show in Paris, which was staged in the grounds of the Rodin Museum. One model appeared to be a dead ringer for Australia's Tiah Eckhardt. The model in question was, in fact, Sweden's Frida Gustavsson (number 24 in this Style.com pic gallery of the show). As it turns out, Eckhardt was otherwise occupied yesterday, and coincidentally in her own garden of earthly delights: marrying her babydaddy Patrick Delaney in front of a small group of friends in the Rose Garden at Centennial Park. The bride wore? Not Dior haute couture, but a vintage strapless white leather minidress. The happy couple may soon be about to celebrate some other very exciting news. No, not another baby - Eckhardt revealed to frockwriter that she has just auditioned for one of (numerous) upcoming instalments of the X Men film franchise.

These include X Men: First Class, in which James McEvoy and Michael Fassbender have already been cast, with Twentieth Century Fox reportedly also interested in Twilight star Taylor Lautner.

This could be a very interesting career move for redhead bombshell who already has quite the cult following, following her appearances in French Playboy and a raft of other art titles, in addition to an advertising campaign for high profile British lingerie brand Agent Provocateur.

Eckhardt also confirmed that she did indeed shoot a campaign for iconic French lingerie and swimwear brand Eres earlier this year in Paris - as first reported by frockwriter. The shoot was with David Bellemere, with whom Eckhardt had previously worked for French Marie Claire. Currently fronted by Lara Stone, Eckhardt's campaign was shot a year in advance she reports.

Eckhardt was unable to provide any other details regarding X Men, beyond the fact that she auditioned in Sydney for the Christine King casting agency, which contacted her through her mother agency, Viviens (two other Viviens models also did the X Men audition). Coincidentally, Viviens also represents Gemma Ward.

With Ward already cast in Pirates of the Caribbean 4 and recently auditioning for Mad Max 4, might we soon be witnessing the summer of the Australian model-turned-action heroine?

Tiah Eckhardt to replace Lara Stone for Eres?

warwick saint/S magazine via TFS

As in Eres, the high profile French luxury lingerie brand. Well these are the whispers coming out of Paris where, as already mentioned by Eckhardt on her blog, she is currently on assignment for five days - having left three month old daughter Finley Victoria in the care of her mother back home. It’s not so inconceivable – and not just because Eckhardt's rates would be lower than those now commanded by Stone, who has emerged as one of the world's most in demand models over the past twelve months (and is presumably now a little too expensive for some). A fashion model who, her friends say, once dabbled in burlesque in Sydney, Eckhardt has clocked up quite a body, pardon the pun, of nude work since leaving Australia. The publications include no less than French Playboy. And Eckhardt's best-known ad campaign to date just happens to have been for cult British lingerie brand Agent Provocateur. You may recall her role as a French maid in this video for Agent Provocateur's Fall/Winter 07/08 'Lady of The Manor' campaign shot by David Bailey, co-starring Catherine Bailey and Daisy Lowe.