Hunter’s Moon

‘IF Ultimo had any doubts about employing a 34-year-old mother-of-two as the ‘face’ of their lingerie range, a quick look at today’s papers would quickly dispel such thoughts.

Vanessa Feltz was pleased with post-airbrush results

For, Rachel Hunter shows a talent for self-publicity that would make Victoria Beckham blush.

Of course, the ability to publish pictures of a blonde in her briefs is excuse enough for the Sun to devote its hallowed Page 3 slot to the New Zealand-born ex-wife of Rod Stewart.

But it takes more than that to persuade papers like the Express and Mail to cover the launch of a new lingerie range.

And both papers are quick to spot that the Amazonian beauty who appears in the Ultimo pictures bears little resemblance to the real Rachel.

Indeed, the Mail publishes pictures of the two side by side and highlights where the airbrush has been at work.

‘The promotional pictures show a toned, almost muscular stomach,’ one onlooker says, ‘whereas in the flesh you could see a much fuller stomach through the slip she was wearing.’

So what, Rachel tells the Express.

‘I was airbrushed but I don’t understand why people go on about it. Airbrushing happens to everyone, in every magazine.

‘I do think it’s great that I’m doing modelling like this at my age and after having had two kids. It’s a time to celebrate your body, not to cover it up.’

Even better, it’s time to celebrate a magazine editor’s idea of what your body should look like.

But despite not having seen a non-airbrushed picture of herself since her sixth birthday, the Express says Rachel is still ‘as skittish about her body as other women’.

‘I’ve always been insecure about my bottom,’ she says, ‘but then most women are. It’s a beast.’

Indeed it is – and, may we say, quite unlike Penny Lancaster’s beautiful derriere.’

Posted: 23rd, March 2004 | In: Tabloids Comment | TrackBack | Permalink