The hottest supermodels come from Brazil. Everybody knows that. Where would the Victoria’s Secret catalogue be without this genetically blessed South American nation?

A recent New York Times exposé on the subject of “model hunting” reveals that scouts target the rural Brazilian towns that were colonized by Europeans and pray that the current citizens will still look European enough. Modeling agents are searching for the ideal Brazilian girl who has a blend of German, Italian, and/or Russian in her DNA.

I look at Gisele Bündchen, the world’s highest paid supermodel, and I say to myself, “This girl’s got the whole package!” But apparently the tall, skinny, extra-long-legged type with great breasts, perfect European features, and fair skin, is far from native native to Brazil. Percentage-wise, darker-skinned women are more representative of the country as a whole.

But as long as the industry wants The Giseles of the world, model scouts will search for the next famous face in Rio Grande do Sul, a region of farmland where the colonizers were German and Italian. Something in the air must foster a potentially lucrative trait in the female youth, so that they grow up to look like the angels of the mass media’s dreams.

- Haley Hogan

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