Model Daul Kim Found Dead in Her Paris Apartment

By Kendra Gilbert on November 20th, 2009

News broke yesterday that 20-year-old model Daul Kim had been found dead in her Paris apartment. Police now believe her death was a suicide as it appears she hung herself. As much as I pride myself on knowing every fashion model and every fashion designer out there, I had never heard of Daul until yesterday. Until it was too late. I’m sorry I hadn’t been following her career all along. She seemed like much more than a model–even as she was at the top of the modeling world. She was more an old soul with a deep interest in art, film and, yes, life.
(See her video diaries below…via NYmag.com)

I was going to write a post about Cindy Crawford’s comments regarding the backlash against skinny models in fashion magazines. But, from what I’ve learned about Daul in the past few minutes, through reading news stories about her death, I think this is much more important. Her career was phenomenal. I can’t believe most people, myself included, had never heard of her. She was a muse to Karl Lagerfeld and had walked in numerous Chanel shows. She had been on the cover of Korean Vogue twice and was a darling of edgy fashion magazines like i-D and V. She did ad campaigns for H&M and Moschino. She was literally a top model. But, as is often said, it can be lonely at the top.

It seems Daul thought so. In this age of blogs and bloggers, we can literally know what someone is doing every minute of her life. Daul included, as she kept a blog. I suggest you read it. It’s wistful and passionate. And a little funny. And a little sad. But what is haunting in this case is that her blog opened up the last few days of her life to the world. Her final post, dated the day before she was found dead, was titled, “say hi to forever.”

But look past that last post. Daul left behind some beautiful stuff for us to enjoy and appreciate.