Christobelle Grierson-Ryrie has been able to schedule modelling around her studies. Photo / Doug Sherring
The winner of last year's competition has managed to launch her career while completing her schooling.
Christobelle Grierson-Ryrie can't believe it's been more than a year since she was crowned the New Zealand's first Next Top Model.
Some would say she had dropped off the radar since winning the Covergirl contract and shooting advertisements for Impulse, but behind the scenes she has been a rather busy
model-cum-school-girl.
As she was just 16 when she won, Grierson-Ryrie returned to Diocesan School in Epsom to complete NCEA Level 2 and is now just a few months off completing her final year.
She has learned to juggle her schoolwork with a burgeoning modelling career - since Top Model she has worked for Trelise Cooper, Yvonne Bennetti, Ed Hardy, Glassons, Farmers and recently shot a commercial in Sydney for Nivea with Australia's latest top model.
Fortunately the agencies have been willing to accommodate her school commitments and most of the work has taken place in the evenings or in the weekend.
"It's busy, but I suppose before Top Model I used to spend the time I now spend modelling, I don't know, watching TV or something, so it's not like that time was being used in a more productive way beforehand."
Right now she is deciding whether to go to London or New York for a gap year before starting university - Next Models in New York have already taken her on.
NZNTM host Sara Tetro says Grierson-Ryrie inspired a younger bunch of girls to audition for the second season of the show.
That's flattering, says Grierson-Ryrie, but she hopes that if the next winner is still at school, they stay there, as it is possible to juggle both study and paid modelling work.
It wasn't easy to slip back into the lifestyle of a Year 12 student after winning, she says. "I would just sit in class going 'What are you going on about?', but I gradually picked it up."
She had to juggle the readjustment with media interviews and appearances, which was a new experience.
But the attention she got at school was more nerve-racking than dealing with the media or the rolling cameras while shooting the show, Grierson-Ryrie says.
"I was called up in front of the whole school and that was really scary. They showed the clip of when they said I had won and I just stood there and went bright red because I'm really bad at that sort of thing," she recalls.
"When you are shooting the show you are only in front of the crew and the cameramen and judges and the girls, you become numb to it."
