You could say that Adriana Lima is used to having her image captured. Over the years, the supermodel has been shot by photography’s greats and strutted her stuff down endless runways, but it seems that nothing could prepare the catwalk vet for her latest likeness: a life-size wax figure created by the experts at Madame Tussauds. Getting a wax figure is something of a celebrity benchmark; you have to be famous enough that people will pay to see and pose with a replica, but you also need to be relevant enough that you resonate with the youthful, largely tourist-based clientele. As the most prominent member of Victoria’s Secret’s roster, Lima ticks both boxes. Joining everyone from Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie Pitt to President Obama, Lima will now be a presence in New York’s outpost of the museum as one of the few models—and the very first Victoria’s Secret Angel—to be immortalized in wax. Lima, who was reached by email and who walked in her 15th Victoria’s Secret show this year, was not expecting the honor: “When I was told that Madame Tussauds wanted to make a wax figure out of me, I was shocked!” said Lima. “The first thing I asked was who made this possible?” As it turns out, the selection came courtesy of Lima’s dedicated fans, thousands of whom took the time to submit her name online to Tussauds for consideration—a fact that makes the model all the more grateful: “[When] I found out that it all came about through fan requests, I almost cried. What an incredible honor and gift from people who have supported me throughout my career.”
Given the intricacies of creating a lifelike wax figure, the process of going from idea to final product is an involved one, with multiple sculptors and hundreds of precise physical measurements to replicate the subject’s exact proportions. For Lima, that meant hours spent with the Tussauds team to ensure perfection. “I wanted to make sure that it looked just like me, from my chin birthmark to my tattoo. So I flew to New York and had a sitting that took more than three hours,” said Lima. “They measured every point of my body to make sure they had everything right. I had to stand in heels in the pose almost the whole time. It wasn’t easy, but I am so happy about how it came out.” The resulting figure is an uncanny representation of Lima’s famous face and body, complete with crimson angel wings and come-hither stare. Side by side, it’s hard to tell the difference between the two, but for Lima that was exactly the goal: “Sometimes a picture really says a thousand words, and they captured my face perfectly. I looked at her, well, ‘me,’ and I was shocked. Everyone was asking me to stand next to her and pose, but all I wanted to do was stand face-to-face to look at all of the details. I can’t believe how much she looks like me, but I guess that’s the whole point, right?”
Watch Adriana Lima do the Swerve: