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'Next Top Model' Wins 'Too Fat' Lawsuit Over Size of Her Hips

By Stephanie Rabiner, Esq. on March 12, 2012 | Last updated on March 21, 2019

Ananda Marchildon, the 2008 winner of Holland's Next Top Model, is not fat. In fact, she's so not fat, a Dutch court has declared it so.

The 25-year-old model has been awarded $85,000 in a lawsuit filed against Elite Model Management. The agency dropped her as a client for being too fat. Her hips measured about 36.2 inches when she won, but handlers wanted her to measure in at only 35.4 inches.

She refused to get any smaller.

Marchildon sued for the remainder of the three-year contract she won as part of her Holland's Next Top Model prize. The agency had monitored her weight, ordered her to work out, and to go on a diet, reports the Associated Press. But when she refused to go lower than her original size, she was fired after only $13,000 of work.

The Dutch court ruled that the dismissal was improper, as Elite could not legally demand a smaller hip size than what Ananda Marchildon had when she won the show.

Whether Marchildon would have also won had she sued in the United States is up for debate. The model originally signed a contract with Modelmasters the Agency (MTA), explains the Daily Beast. When that agency folded, Elite picked up its clients. The agency argued that it never assumed the Holland's Next Top Model contract, and is therefore not responsible for the remainder of its value.

On these facts alone, it's impossible to predict a stateside outcome. Ananda Marchildon's fate would have instead rested on the terms of the MTA and Elite contracts alone.

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