Fashion Model Directory

The Fashion Model Directory (FMD) is an online database of information about female fashion models, modeling agencies and fashion designers. FMD is often denoted as the IMDb of the fashion industry. The project was started in 1996 by Stuart Howard and was taken over by FashionOne Group in 2002.

The Fashion Model Directory consists of the largest database about professional female fashion models, modeling agencies and fashion designers. In many cases, the information about the fashion models goes beyond simple statistics or biographical details to include complete information about advertisements, magazine covers, fashion shows, hobbies, notes and links to official and other websites.
Furthermore, FMD provides an extensive picture gallery for each fashion model including copyright information and photographer where available. The modeling agencies database includes contact information such as the address, official website, divisions, type of business, offices and notes. Each agency is being marked with MVA-logo after being reviewed and verified by a selected team modeling-experts.
FMD also offers an identification tool for unknown models, a model of the month interview, modeling news/gossip, user polls and ratings, and special features such as the favorites lists and submission or error-report options. The website also has an active but insignificant message board.
The FMD is a free site, which requires registration to access its complete range of functions. To register you need to have a valid e-mail account and a web browser that accepts cookies.
Registered users can also create a "my favorites list," which is a list of favorite fashion models that can be shared with the public.
Site visitors wishing only to view information without accessing interactive features can do so without registration. The site is available in two languages: English and German .

FMD was started as a private offline project in early 1996 by Stuart Howard. One year later the database went online and was updated every week and the only way to submit information was to send an email. The design used to be very basic and there were no advanced features except a simple search engine.
The first online URL for FMD was www.threestrings.com/stuart/, which was part of a personal website before changing to the current webaddress in 2001.
In 2002 the database was destined to disappear from the web because the time exposure of the project exceeded the possible.
After a short offline-time the project was taken over by FashionOne Group, which invested time and money to restart with a new design as well as new functions.
Three years later, in 2005, the project has been reprogrammed and redesigned again.

The home page has had some changes over the years. Mostly showing new features on the site and recent releases.

• The front page in 2001
  The front page in 2001
• The front page after a redesign in 2004
  The front page after a redesign in 2004
• The front in 2007
  The front in 2007

At present, the database includes over 6,000 fashion models, 150 fashion designers and 700 modeling agencies. In 2007 FMD announced the launch of MVA (Most Valuable Agency), a new verification, testing and certification program for modeling agencies. Their objective is to provide credible information about modeling agencies and to sort out and render public all fraudulent and dubious agencies before they can do any harm. Therefore MVA also provides scam alerts and warnings as well as complaints submitted by professional fashion models. Furthermore, the information is being synchronized with a selected list of consumer protection of several countries around the world such as the BBB or FTC.

General responding time to questions or submissions is very unsatisfying and takes a very long time. There is a shorter URL FMD1.com for quick access.

• Supermodels
• Modeling agency
• Fashion Designer
• Internet Movie Database
• Certification

• Fashion Model Directory — official website
• FMD - AboutUS statistics