Getting to Know Chanel Stewart

May 25, 2015

Up-n-coming, Australia-based model Chanel Stewart is definitely someone to keep on your radar and we’re sure you can expect big things from her in the future. We were eager to find out more about Chanel, so here she is, in her own words:

I am… both a cat and a dog person. Being both gives you insight into my inability to make decisions and confusion in life as to why a girl can’t have everything. I am forever thinking what my next step is and it has to be forward. I am an avid tea drinker and find my centre in tree pose when practicing yoga.

My party trick is to suddenly sing along to most hip-hop and rap songs and shock people that a part-Burmese/Australian girl can know such music, let alone each word and cuss.

I never really considered modelling full-time and worked really hard in high school to get good marks to get into University. Six months on, I am living in Sydney, casting, shooting, flying places for work. It’s pretty great. It’s funny how at one point of your life you were so set on something and a year later you are so far away from what you anticipated. I like that. I like that life does that to you sometimes. Oh, and by the way my name is Chanel Stewart, I don’t have a middle name and I am 18-years-old.

Modelling is… never what anyone expects it to be unless they are actually a model. Modelling is a job where there are amazing opportunities to meet the world’s best creative teams and have picturesque settings as your office each day. It is where you can make some of your greatest girlfriends from working together whilst wearing incredible clothes.

However, the side that people outside of the industry don’t get to see is my freezing body shivering in the middle of winter in a bikini while trying to look as if it’s 40 degrees, it’s the blisters on girl’s feet that start to bleed, it’s the task of really eating healthily so your skin radiates and exercising so you stay fit. When people say ‘you have the easiest job in the world’ I always say sure, my job is incredible and I am fortunate for being able to do what I do, but I never forget to reinforce how hard we work as models and always invite them to join me on set for a 12-hour day and see how they last!

When I’m not modelling… it’s ‘Chanel time’, which consists of spending time with my friends and family or watching Netflix. I love this stage of my life where modelling is my full-time job and occupies a substantial amount of my life. I realise that you can’t model forever so I am really embracing just shooting and working with great people until I go to university or continue on a different pathway.

Home is… a small coastal town in Northern NSW called Coffs Harbour, aka the home of the Big Banana. Growing up there most of my life, I crave to be back there when I am in the city traffic or trying to find a park at a Sydney beach. There are moments in my life when, immersed in the big smoke, I crave to sit and drink endless cups of tea at my grandma’s house and overlook the little town. Or when I go for a morning swim in the ocean then drive half-an-hour and be in dense rainforest exploring rivers with no cell reception. It is a little gem to me and, as much as I love living in Sydney right now, a little sigh will always escape me as I arrive in good ol’ Coffs.

I spend too much time… grocery shopping. It’s ridiculously good but at the same time I feel like I should be doing far more significant things. I usually only buy a handful of things from the fruit and veg aisle but the monotony of strolling down each section is just something that I find somewhat therapeutic.

I’m currently listening to… Kendrick Lamar’s new album ‘To Pimp a Butterfly’. I’m really into my hip-hop.

It might surprise people to learn that… I am an English literature nerd. Since I was young I have always found books a little escape from my own reality and still do today. When I was in high school I did four unit English and Extension History, so I’ve always found it really fascinating. I am currently reading ‘A Fine Balance’ by Rohinton Mistry. My all-time favourite book is ‘Shantaram’ by Gregory David Roberts. I have read it twice and each time it has an underlying objective in making the reader have a greater sense of gratitude and forces us to realise there is so much more in the world than just our ordinary day-to-day lives. It makes me feel these intense emotions, things that no other book can evoke from me. I feel people judge me, as they think my profession is somewhat superficial, so I am sure people would be surprised to learn that I thrive on literature and keeping my brain active.

I’ve never… liked lizards. Writing this and thinking about them makes me cringe. I have a ridiculously massive fear of them, even to the extent that I have regular nightmares of them chasing me. Their scaly dry skin, long thin tail and, worst of all, the sharp claws that scamper across the floor towards you… need I say more? I have never liked them, and never will.

In the future… I want to travel through Nepal, Tibet and Bhutan. Those three countries have always been on my bucket list. I have had this dream since I was about 15-years-old to drop off the face of the earth for some time, turn off my phone, disconnect from the world I know today and go and hike through those countries on foot. I think that it would be pretty life-changing stuff. Also, I want to keep on being grounded and true to myself, I think that is essential for the life I live.