The Life and Mind of TENLEY NORDSTROM

Q&A

Congratulations on Premier in London and the card is hotness. Lovin the blog and we think many around the world will too. You are taking the best travel photos. Feels like we're there.

Thank you. I am really Excited to be in London for the summer. I am so glad you like my blog! It's a new thing I started.


Tell us about your background coming from North Dakota.

I grew up in a town called Minot in North Dakota. It has a population of about 30,000. Which is a big city in North Dakota. I love my state and I am glad that I grew up there. I think that it's very middle class and the values are just a bit different. People there are very honest. We are, for example, about the only state who has an economy doing well right now. People aren't really going around trying to pull tricks on each other. It's really shielded us from what is happening right now in the states. We have a lot of farmers. I really love growing up in a place where cows are grazing in the grass, wheat fields are growing and so on. Loving big open spaces and being out in nature has really stayed with me.


How did you get started in the Modeling World?

I started modeling about 3 years ago. I had just started college at the time. Was on vacation with my mother in NYC for the first time. A photographer kind of plucked me off the street. He thought I had potential. Took some Polaroids and sent them around to agencies. Found an agency the next day. And moved to NYC a month later. I fell into modeling but I knew right away I loved it. I have a love for photography in general. And I love being apart of creating photographs. I love traveling. As a model there are so many opportunities presented to you. I would not have been able to do so many of the things I have done in life if I wasn't a model.

Who is your mother agency?

My mother agent is Ford LA and that is where I am now based. I've worked in NYC, Milan, Korea and I have an agency in Copenhagen also. 

What was your favorite market/city so far?

I am really digging London so far. Even though I have only been here a week. I think it really suites me. I can be my rocker chick self and I love that. Hopefully it will continue to be amazing for the summer! For living, I love LA. Work has been good to me there also. I love so many things about LA. The music scene is amazing. It's not so urban either. Downtown is, but it's not a cement jungle for the most part. It's a beautiful place. I mostly love that even though it is a big city, and has all the great things that go along with that, But also you have the ocean and the mountains and you can really get out and feel like you are in the middle of no where. I started surfing when I moved to LA so that has really sucked me in also! haha :)

Tell us some of your favorite shoots.

I worked with an Australian photographer, Edwin Datoc, a lot in New York. We would just get together and do whatever we felt creatively. Rent out a room in the Chelsea hotel or whatever and just have loads of fun and take great photos. I love being able to shoot with film. A lot of the shoots I love are the ones that don't pay any money, which is a problem! haha. I just love creating photos and being able to really get into it with a photographer. Another photographer I love is Cameron Smith. We shot in LA for Russh Magazine. He is the one who encouraged me to come to London (he is based here). I loved working for a DJ headphone company called Aerial 7. Really great people and the photographer, Kat Bochart is awesome. I have also worked with Men's Health twice and loved it. And the people at Cosmopolitan are great too. Most every body I work with is really great to tell you the truth! So I will stop rambling! 

Do you get inspired by stuff outside of fashion? 

I am inspired constantly by the world around me. I am such a water person. The way I feel when I am out in the ocean surfing is indescribable. To be out there, just a dot, in this huge body of water. Dolphins and all kinds of creatures.  And the feeling of riding a wave is just amazing. It blows my mind. I think the natural world is constant source of inspiration. I love art also, mostly painting. I was in heaven for a week in Amsterdam. I was seeing so many great paintings from the best artists that have lived. It really inspired me to want to start painting myself when I get back to LA and get my own place again. Music has always been a huge part of my life. I played piano and numerous other instruments growing up.  I was in Chorus and other singing groups. I think it's a great way of getting out your emotions. I could not live with out it. Also, whenever you are feeling a certain way, you can always find a song to go along with that mood and for some reason that is so comforting. I also could not do with out my friends and family. They are so important to keeping my head straight. Modeling can be rough on the psyche. They help you to really feel like yourself again. It's such an important thing. 

What have you learned on your travels?

When I quit college to move to NYC and start modeling, a lot of people thought I was crazy. I have always done well in school and a lot of people still tell me I am wasting my brain away by being a model. But I've come to realize that I have learned so much since I started modeling. Moving from a place like North Dakota to NYC is so eye opening. You meet so many people from so many walks of life. And you can learn so much from that. Coming from a place in the country to a place like NYC, it is really sink or swim. I really had to grow a tough skin. I am still the same person at the core, but I opened myself up to what other people were going through and tried to learn from it myself. Going to other countries and seeing how people live is really amazing and eye opening too. You learn so much when you see that there are other ways of doing things. I think so many people let fear control their lives. I can also fall into this. I think that the more I break free of fear, the better off I am. So many times I have had to just jump in head first and then figure things out as I went. And I have learned so much from that. Life is not as scary as we can make it out to be. Taking chances is a big part of modeling and it's really seeped into the rest of my way of living. Taking a chance, not only on myself, but on other people. You are constantly showing up to shoots with a whole bunch of people you have never met before. And you have to get along and trust each other. Trust that they were hired for their expertise. You all were. To come up with whatever outcome that job needs. Learning from these kind of situations is great. You can really apply a lot of these things in your every day life and how you deal with people. Sometimes when you hear yourself telling someone that you are going over to Korea(or wherever) by yourself to meet and work with an agency you haven't met with yet. And to HOPE that you get jobs... You realize how crazy it sounds! But then you realize how cool it is that you are willing to stick your neck out and take that chance. And most of the time things work out. Even if a situation turns to shit, it in the end was a good experience. Mostly my time being a model in the past three years has really shown me how important it is to know that there is always more to learn. Always more out there that you don't know. There are people out there that you've never heard of because they are doing things outside of the norm. People in general don't like that. They want what is comfortable. They want familiar. Modeling has taught me that that isn't always a good thing. A lot of times the people on the outside doing "Crazy things" are the ones that exactly get it. For example, I am reading Howard Zinn's "The People's History of the United States." I am learning so much of our hidden history and it is amazing. I love learning about the people that struggled for the things that we enjoy today. It's so inspiring. A lot of times the guy at the top gets the credit, but it's mostly the people underneath coming together to create something that is amazing. The people that didn't want to just sink into a comfortable pattern. The people that knew they could take chances and fight for something better. I think we should always have a hunger to want to know. A hunger for life and all that it has to offer. Don't shut yourself down to the world. Don't stay in your comfortable little shell. Find other people who refused to stay in that comfortable little shell to inspire you. For me, the real education is from life experience and travel. Taking a big jump into the unknown will really reward you.

Anything to leave us by?

Always be Fearless. And do not let the rejection phase you. No matter who you are, in the modeling world, there is a lot of it. Hemingway is one of my favorite writers. He used this saying in his private letters and on occasion inscribed these words in books he signed for friends. "l faut (d'abord) durer" (One must, above all, endure). 


Check out Tenley's blog:
http://tenleynordstrom.blogspot.com/