Kylie Bisutti

Personal life

Bisutti (née Ludlow) was born in Simi Valley, California and grew up in Las Vegas, Nevada. Her father was a professional poker dealer, and her mother was a housekeeper. At 15, she was invited by a friend from high school to a church youth group party, and after learning more about Christianity, became a Christian herself.

For her 18th birthday, her parents took her on along on her father's company retreat to Mexico, where she met her father's co-worker, Mike Bisutti, whom she began dating and later married in Cabo San Lucas in 2009. They now live in Montana. On January 21, 2014, they welcomed their first child, a boy named Jase Michael Bisutti. She also has two other sons; Luca and Seth.

Career

Bisutti aspired to be a Victoria's Secret model from a young age, and recalls being told by friends and strangers to become a model. She won her first casting call at age eight and began modeling regularly at the Fashion Show Mall in Las Vegas. At 16, she moved to New York City to pursue modeling full-time. She lived with four other models in an apartment. She says she stayed away from alcohol and clubs.

Following her marriage, her husband's stepmom saw a flier for the 2009 "Victoria's Secret Model Search" competition and she decided to enter. She went to the audition in Los Angeles, where Victoria's Secret executive Ed Razek called her runway walk one of the best he had ever seen. Shortly after the audition, she was named to the top 10 to compete in the televised contest, and later became one of the two finalists along with Jamie Lee Darley. She was voted the winner of the competition and walked the runway at the 2009 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show in a bra and panties, feeling "on top of the world".

Bisutti later wrote for The New York Post of her Victoria's Secret Fashion Show walk, "[E]ven though I was only 19, a newlywed and growing in my relationship to God, I didn’t think twice about strutting my stuff in skimpy bikinis and underwear in the TV contest." She went on to claim that during the competition she was pushed to play down her marriage, because she was "supposed to be flirting with everyone all the time" and that married models were told to keep quiet about their marriages unless they were married to a celebrity because it drew more attention to the brand. She later modeled for FHM and Maxim.

In May 2013, Bisutti released her memoir I'm No Angel: From Victoria's Secret Model to Role Model, describing her life and detailing how, after the show, she became disillusioned with modeling, due to the provocative nature of the work, developing body image issues, and negative experiences with photographers. She claimed she went through "unhealthy" things to book jobs, such as crash and starvation diets, saying those behaviors are common practice among models. She said, "For little girls looking in, it's really not good for them to see those things." Bisutti decided to quit modeling, a decision her husband supported. She tweeted, "I quit being a VS model to be a Proverbs 31 wife."

Prior to the book's release, Victoria's Secret released a statement claiming Bisutti had made "numerous fabrications and misstatements…She was never a Victoria's Secret 'Angel' as defined by the terms of our Angel model contract. And contrary to Ms. Bisutti's claims, she was never offered any subsequent modeling contracts or opportunities with Victoria's Secret despite her multiple appeals for further work." Bisutti responded in an interview: "All the truth is in the book. … My book is really not about Victoria's Secret. It's about the modeling industry as a whole and about helping girls with self-body image issues, eating disorders and really exposing the entire industry for what it is. It's not targeting their brand."

She is launching a clothing line that promotes modesty that "will feature models of all shapes and sizes … I want girls to see people who look like them, so they feel good about themselves."