Alek Wek was discovered by fashion agents in London in a shopping center in 1995 at the age of 18 and one year later she became involved seriously in fashion by being a model in the Ford Agency in Paris, which was followed by Milan in Italy and New York in the USA.

Wek has gained an astonishing success and has been awarded for her modeling achievements with Best New Model award, MTV Model in 1997, Model of the Decade Award, the Venus de la Mode Award in 1997 and by being ranked in such global fashion and beauty lists as People magazine’s “50 Most Beautiful People” and “50 Most Influential Faces in Fashion”, and "World's greatest supermodel".

Wek has achieved fame as a model for being in such top fashion design shows as Calvin Klein, Victoria's Secret, Valentino, Fendi, Gucci, Vivienne Westwood, and Chanel. In 2002 Alek Wek was considered to be the most expensive top model in the world next to Carmen Kass, Heidi Klum, and Gisele Bundchen.

Alek Wek has been mostly involved in modeling, however she has done some acting, being in the movie "The Four Feathers", which was made in 2002. In addition, Wek is also fashion designer, launching her handbag line "Wek 1933" being inspired by African culture.

A "Hollywood" driven (anorexic young women) industry perpetuated by people in the television and movie industry needs to be tackled head on with a great big smack to the head. Most of the actors are young, most of the actors are thin. Old and curvy is discarded by this industry, and if we do nothing then we are accepting that and endorsing it.

Women with curves and large bodies are real and the sickly looking thin models are projecting a false image of every day women. I once wrote to a big company complaining about their t.v. ad and their skinny model. Whether one complaint made a difference I don't know but if enough women reacted and complained we could show them who has the power. I refuse to buy anything from their store and haven't heard that they would stop using skinny models. Until I hear differently I told them I won't ever shop in their store again. And I haven't.

Write to the companies that advertise with these type of models because they are making a hit on our impressionable teens, make your voice and opinion heard.

Your teenagers, like most teenagers that are probably starving themselves to fit into the "look" that these twerps in Hollywood set for a standard will thank you and just maybe enjoy their meal for once guilt free!

Realizing the problem exists is a one step but following through with the courage to speak up is key. If enough women are bothered by this then, we would begin to see the effect.