Meet Kholood Breiche

Today we’d like to introduce you to Kholood Breiche.

Kholood, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
I am a model and an Architect from Lebanon. Modeling has been my passion ever since I was young but living in Lebanon, this career wasn’t an option to think about, and that’s why I ended up studying Architecture for six years. It’s scientifically proven to be one of the hardest majors, but I had to finish it and make my parents proud. By the time I was done, I was DONE with architecture and with leaving my passion aside for so long.

One year later, I moved to LA and left everything behind me – architecture, my business, my real estate certificate– and I gave my full focus to modeling. I am now signed with a modeling agency in LA and I am moving to NY next month to continue my journey in modeling and entrepreneurship.

Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
Well, I am now 27 and I’m still pushing to get to my goal in modeling. I thought it was going to be easy before I started getting rejections from agencies because of my portfolio, my hips, my age (25 back then), and my stubborn acne that appeared again after a ten months intense treatment and years of trying different medications. And that’s when one of the modeling agents told me “honey, go fix your skin before walking into an agency like that”. But one rejection after the other made me stronger and less caring about the future rejections.

After I finally got signed with an agency, I wasn’t booking as many jobs as I thought I would. I went to NY for a month this fall to “prepare” for NYFW, with acne all over my face. When I met my agent, who wasn’t very happy about my acne, she gave me three days “to get rid of them” because clients want “perfect skin”. But I’m not the type of person who gives up easily. I found my way to different castings, and I ended up walking for ten designers in my first time in NYFW. To tell you I wasn’t affected mentally and emotionally by the industry’s tough judgment of appearances I would be lying, but now I give those rejections as examples to the people who are about to give up or those who have less confidence or insecurities because of something they think is wrong with their looks. They assume models are flawless and perfect, and this is where my role comes to show them my bare skin and how it didn’t stop me from going after my goals, in hopes that my story would help boost their confidence and their belief in themselves.

We’d love to hear more about your work and what you are currently focused on. What else should we know?
As I said modeling is my passion and neither my age, nor my stubborn acne, or my 41” hips are going to stop me from getting to the top. I always remind the people around me and on social media that anything is possible and they can achieve anything they set their mind to. And I’m determined to help as many people who suffer from the same problems or who have limitations in their heads by proving to them that rules are meant to be broken and that they can achieve what they want no matter how hard things get. And to accomplish that, I am doing online classes for models who are starting out in this industry to guide them and give them advice based on my knowledge and experience. I also have a project I am working on with a model friend that I’m positive will leave its impact in the modeling industry, and on a people’s lives specifically, especially on their confidence, because I feel like confidence is a major factor when you want to achieve your goals.

Aside from modeling, I am very interested in the world of business and entrepreneurship. So besides the modeling projects, I am starting my journey in learning more about building businesses and investing, and I am trying to combine both of my passions together whenever I get the chance to.

What is “success” or “successful” for you?
In my opinion, finding what your purpose is in life and how you will impact the people around you is one aspect of success. Once you know why you were born and what it is that you want to do that will make you truly happy, then your job is to do whatever it takes to get to that goal. Accepting failure and embracing it with all your heart and mind is also part of the process, because you can never get to where you want before failing many times and standing up stronger and more resilient every-time. To me, success is not about doing a big step at once, it is more about the baby steps you take every day. The little successes you achieve every day, the improvements you accomplish every day, learning more about what you want to achieve until you become a master in it, putting in the 10,000 hours of practice that not everyone will do, and fighting for what you want until you get it. It’s about not taking no for an answer, finding a way when there seems to be none, and helping the people around you on the way there. Bottom line is, you have to do what 90% of the people don’t do to become really successful, but always check in with yourself to make sure that what you are doing is making you happy. Because as cliche as it sounds, you only live once, so why waste all that time on doing something you don’t enjoy, no matter how much money it will make you, just like architecture to me.

Image Credit:
Sam A. Lazo Garcia, Jimmy Romano, Meera Fox, Nader Chehade

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