Amanda of AusNTM on BCBG Max Azria SS 2012

I was looking at the first batch of collections of New York Fashion Week, and as always BCBG Max Azria was one of the first labels to present. I read on Altamira that for models the BCBG Max Azria runway is a good indicator of their success for the entire season.

But today when I looked at the photos of its collection (also see the video here), I was more entranced by the amazing dresses than the models themselves. Suddenly I spotted a familiar face, that of Amanda Ware, who won the sixth cycle of Australia's next top model.

Isn't it exciting that she's walking with the likes of Arizona Muse, Fei Fei Sun, Ruby Aldridge, and Sara Blomqvist?

Amanda is a good model, a favorite of mine early into the competition. Her win was however overshadowed by the horrid mistake of the host in announcing on live TV the winning model of that season. So I am pleasantly surprised that Amanda is making a name for her self on the modeling scene despite that rather awkward launching.

A quick look at Amanda's Wikipedia entry showed that she in fact debuted during the 2011 fall-winter shows, appearing on Philip Lim and L'Wren Scott, among a few other brands. Seems like AusNTM has another successful model in the making, following Alice Burdeu's reign on the world's major catwalks a few years back.

I'm watching the current season of AusNTM, and really the quality of its contestants is astounding. Picking just one favorite is very challenging. Each girl is unique and simply mind-blowing. It helps of course that they are young, on average about 18 years old, so they are mostly fresh-looking.

On the contrary, ANTM has ceased to become a modeling competition; and especially with the launching of ANTM All Stars (premiering later this month), it's more of a bitch fest for aging has-been (even barely) models.