Two Models From Different Generations on New York, Music, and Spring Style

I first met Sylke Golding (pronounced zil-kuh), our 53-year-old model turned architectural-firm manager turned mannequin once again, and our 20-year-old model and musician Tomy Grein at the fitting for this shoot back in late February. Whereas any presumptions I had about this pair should have vanished as quickly as they each, in turn, tucked their similar haircuts behind their ears whereas saying howdy, I was positive these two would differ when it comes to their type personalities (and actual personalities). Spoiler: I used to be wildly incorrect on both fronts.

I’ll be the first to admit that I did not anticipate Golding, who walked in sporting very on-trend lug-sole boots and a belted puffer jacket, to gravitate as shortly as Grein did toward a backless sequin bodysuit that hung among the vary of spring Gucci ready-to-wear we’d prepared on a rack. However that was just the start of their shared senses. It shortly turned clear that these two seemingly very totally different ladies have been sudden kindred spirits in more methods than I might have anticipated.

Like so many fashions, each Golding and Grein now call New York Metropolis house, each having found their solution to the middle of the style world someplace around the age of 20. Grein, born one among 10 youngsters in Ethiopia, truly spent nearly all of her childhood and teenage years growing up in the South. In New Orleans, she lived in the identical neighborhood as Lil Wayne, which influenced every little thing from the music to the style that surrounded her. “It was very Soulja Boy: saggy jeans and rapper streetwear.”

Golding was raised in East Berlin when it was the capital of the German Democratic Republic and The Wall was nonetheless up, and she or he, too, references sartorial reminiscences when describing those years. “All the things was government-owned, so the clothes was all very gray, very drab. We knew about jeans, but we couldn’t purchase jeans.” She additionally mentions that something that was made in America was extremely sought after and only attainable if a West Berliner smuggled it over The Wall.

For both Grein and Golding, ideas about what life can be like as soon as within the U.S. have been largely based mostly on what they noticed on display, and each have been unexpectedly disenchanted once they arrived within the Massive Apple. “I nonetheless keep in mind my first day coming to New York,” Golding tells me. “I was in a taxi and appeared up on the Manhattan skyline, and I was truthfully disenchanted. I was like, ‘That is it?’” Grein’s expectations have been set completely on her favorite American TV show she watched as a younger kid in Ethiopia: The Easy Life. Was she let down to find everyone does not stroll around in miniskirts saying, “That is scorching”? Sure. (Does she nonetheless listing Paris Hilton as considered one of her largest female inspirations? Also yes.)

Relating to similarities, both ladies are at the very least a 23 on a scale of 1 to 10 measuring a passion for music. Golding, who had restricted exposure to music and humanities as a toddler, fell in love with Bob Marley the very first time she stumbled upon his cassette at a pal’s condominium in Paris. “I solely take heed to reggae and dancehall music now. I even married a reggae musician from Jamaica,” she definitively shared. Grein mirrors this degree of enthusiasm, having been surrounded by music her whole life. Her father worked within the business, and sure, he did make a fair try at beginning a household band together with her nine different siblings. Whereas that venture didn’t precisely work out, the ex-ballerina has been making all types of music since she was 15, and people beats run via her veins as really (and unexpectedly) as reggae runs by way of Golding’s.

Golding and Grein are equally enthusiastic about social media and how they will use it for experimenting with their personal fashion and self-expression. Grein tells me, “I feel like, do what the fuck you need and what makes you cheerful. It isn’t anyone’s place to inform anyone what to put on.” Golding chimes in with the knowledge of a lady who’s lived five many years of life on her own phrases. “You couldn’t pay me to be in my 20s again,” she laughs. “Nothing ever actually stops just because you are ‘previous:’ You possibly can put on high-end trend; you’ll be able to gown up any which approach you want.”

What’s definitely probably the most heartwarming to me is that Grein and Golding are equally as in love with New York, regardless of their initial disillusionment with the town and ranging lengths of time they’ve lived there. As someone who moved here solely a yr in the past myself, it reinforces my concept that NY is a type of issues—very similar to spicy food and rollercoasters—that unites people who adore it in a method everybody else who does not reside here can’t begin to know. For Grein, New York represents her new playground, where she will get to make artwork, whether that is modeling, music, or her latest venture, graffiti. Golding has been here for 30 years now but still gets inspired daily by the power and sense of belonging the town generates. “What I really like about New York is that everybody is a foreigner, and subsequently nobody can be a foreigner. There’s a togetherness and unification. We are all from totally different places, however we are all the identical,” she tells me.