Austin Anderton's First Runway Show - Toni&Guy's "Golden Years of Glamour"

Video by Bill Anderton

My daughter, Austin Anderton performed her first runway fashion show for Toni&Guy.

On Friday, October 9, 2015, NorthPark Center began its 50-year anniversary celebration with two days of fashion shows and events. Toni&Guy Hairdressing presented "Golden Years of Glamour," a very large 6 p.m. show on Friday of fashion and hairstyling. The Golden Years of Glamour was the middle of three shows Friday afternoon and evening. The first show at 5 p.m. was presented by the Banana Republic, Dillard's, Gap and Pinto Ranch. The last show at 7 p.m. was Harper's Bazaar Trend show.

Austin opened the Golden Years of Glamour show as the lead-off model in the "Classical Glamour" part of the show. The Classical Glamour section was the first of the five sections of the show that featured about 40 models. All in, it was about a 50-minute show.

This event was Austin Anderton's debut as a professional model represented by The Dragonfly Agency of Dallas. At 18-years of age (as of just two weeks ago), this was her first professional runway fashion show as an adult. Austin was well received by the audience. She did a great first performance. There are lots of things left to learn and experience to be gained, but this was a fantastic start for a first-time rookie.

It was a packed show with standing room only. Daughter of Northpark developer, the late Raymond Nasher, art collector Nancy Nasher who is the current operator/manager of NorthPark was in attendance and sitting immediately in front of my wife and me.

Toni&Guy Academy student Lucchese Luchsinger styled Austin's hair for the show. Austin and Lucchese have been collaborating for several months. Austin was Lucchese's model for the 2015 Photographic Award and is one of the three national finalists for this award. The winner among the three national finalists will be announced on October 25th at a gala that will be hosted in Dallas.

The excellent photo of Lucchese's haircut is shown here. Austin will be modeling in the gala's fashion show as well. The photo was also used in their promotional video. See Austin at 3:23 (m:ss) into the video.

I have lots of personal memories from the incredibly long-lived run of NorthPark as one of the country's premier shopping and fashion centers. We also completed a circle tonight. I attended the grand opening of NorthPark in 1965, 50 years ago, when I was two years younger than Austin is now.

The Show's Artful Venue

The stage and runaway for the show were set up in NortkPark’s North Court.  The runway went through the three legs of the 12-ton, 48-foot-tall sculpture of artist Mark di Suvero titled “Ad Astra.”

Created in 2005, this massive-scale sculpture is composed of steel I-beams and steel plates that are bolted and welded together. Di Suvero is a key figure in postwar American sculpture. This is the only public, indoor installation of his work in the world.

NorthPark has a long tradition of exhibiting significant contemporary artwork throughout the facility. Art, particularly sculpture, was a passion of Raymond Nasher and his family. Nasher’s personal collection includes a substantial number of the world's greatest sculptures, many of which are now in the Nasher Sculpture Center in Dallas, Texas and the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University in Durham, NC.

NorthPark has its own art collection that also makes shopping a cultural experience.

Austin's First Modeling Gig

When Austin was six months old, we started doing her first formal portraits. One of her very first was in a very special christening dress by one of the staff photographers at the studio of the portrait photographer, Arthur Macwhirter. Arthur saw the proofs and ask us if he could use Austin as his model to introduce a new line of large-format black-and-white portraits at Nieman Marcus stores around the country. Her modeling fee would be waiving his usual sitting fee and receiving one of the new portraits. We agreed and it started a long collaboration with Arthur as our primary portrait photographer.

Concurrently, Niemans asked if Austin would model in their Spring fashion show for children's Easter clothes. Austin was in her very first runway show.

That same day as the fashion show, Aurthur Macwhirter debuted the new large-format black-and-white portrait series at Nieman Marcus in Dallas (and soon thereafter, in all of the other stores as well.) After Austin finished the show and changed back into her street clothes, we were leaving the store and saw her finished portrait in the store for the first time.

Nancy sat down in a nearby chair to have a close-up look at the portrait and a group of ladies who were also just leaving the fashion show recognized Austin from the show and were waving and making a fuss over her. In the photo above, Austin is reacting to all of the attention. The ladies were then somewhat shocked to realize that Austin was also the same baby in the portrait behind her and the fussing-over doubled. She was treated like a superstar. Wisely, Aurthur usually located his studio franchise in Neiman's close to the children's department. For several months, until Austin grew older, whenever Nancy and Austin shopped in Niemans, someone would recognize Austin as the "Neiman's baby." For years, there was a copy of this portrait hanging in every Neiman Marcus store in the United States.

I selected a slightly different pose of this portrait for the 40" x 60" version that hangs in my office.

My office at work became known as "the shrine" by co-workers because I filled it with so many photos of Austin. Being a photographer myself, I appreciate good photography and had a lot of my own pictures as well as the work of others hung. The centerpiece, however, was this portrait. I first hung it the night of our open house for the new 75,000-s.f. single-tenant office and data-center building we had just purchased to serve as our first national headquarters in Las Colinas. Just before our guests began to arrive for the evening, I took my friend and colleague, Dr. Dick Ivey into my freshly-decorated office to show him the new portrait and his comment, with a big smile on his face to this beaming daddy was, "Isn't it amazing what unskilled labor can produce!"

Life As a Working Model

Austin never intended to make a career out of modeling. Her interests are more behind the camera than in front of it. Also, her schooling comes first. However, she has fun and it does pay well. It is a great student job.