CNN's Anderson Cooper flashes his fashion credentials at CFDA awards...by announcing he was a child model



Show off: Anderson Cooper as a child model show during the 2011 CFDA Fashion Awards

Hosting something as prestigious as the CFDA awards is an honour usually only reserved for the most fashionable of celebrities.

So you'd be forgiven for wondering what style credentials CNN anchor Anderson Cooper possesses to be given such a privilege.

Although he appeared on stage only twice at Monday night's Council of Fashion Designers of America awards - to open the ceremony and to introduce the Lady Gaga award - he ensured that he informed guests exactly why he deserved to be standing there.

Dressed in a dark Ralph Lauren Black Label suit, the handsome anchor revealed he had once been a childhood model.

And for the most sceptical of audience members, who are used to only seeing him on the front line or behind a desk, he flashed up some head shots of his modelling days.

The black and white picture - showing a young, broody, dark-haired Cooper - drew laughter from the audience.

But it had the desired effect - he had proved his qualifications to the audience at the fashion version of the Oscars as proof of why he deserved to be acting master of ceremonies.

That, and the fact that he is a long-time friend of CFDA president Diane von Furstenberg, and that he is the son of late designer jeans magnate Gloria Vanderbilt.

Cooper has also worked as a fit model for both Calvin Klein and Ralph Lauren.

He joked with the audience: 'There was no way you'd be critical, or that's what Diane said, anyway.'

Before the ceremony he joked: 'I'm not sure I'm qualified. I'm completely unfashionable.'

Fashion Oscars: Anderson Cooper was the host of last night's CFDA awards and looked dapper in a Ralph Lauren Black Label suit, custom-made for the news anchor by Lauren, who he used to model for



The 44-year-old journalist looked dapper in the Ralph Lauren suit which was designed specifically for him.



The anchor has not let his years stand in the way of his fitness and a recent picture of him walking down a Manhattan street shows his rippling biceps and abs through a tight-fitting T-shirt.



Working out: Cooper recently showed off his bulging biceps in a tight-fitting t shirt

But Cooper's fashion credentials span back to before he even knew how to say the word - at the age of three he was photographed by Diane Arbus for Harpers Bazaar, and from age ten to 13 he modelled with Ford Models for Ralph Lauren, Calvin Klein and Macy's.

And it was only natural that Cooper's early days should have been entrenched in fashion. His mother was one of the first to launch a range of designer blue denim jeans.

They carried her name embossed in script on the back pocket, as well as her swan logo. Her jeans were more tightly fitted than the other jeans of that time and she later expanded her range to include dresses, blouses, shoes and perfumes.

His father Wyatt Emory Cooper died during open heart surgery in New York in 1978. He was only 50 years old.

He and Gloria often appeared on the national 'best dressed' lists.

The news anchor's brother Carter committed suicide on July 22, 1988, by jumping from the family's 14th floor apartment as his mother tried in vain to stop him.



Vanderbilt believed that it was caused by a psychotic episode induced by an allergy to the anti-asthma medical prescription drug Proventil.

It was this, which Anderson attributes to pursuing a career in journalism, saying: 'Loss is a theme that I think a lot about, and it’s something in my work that I dwell on.

'I think when you experience any kind of loss, especially the kind I did, you have questions about survival: Why do some people thrive in situations that others can’t tolerate? Would I be able to survive and get on in the world on my own?'

Mother: Gloria Vanderbilt was an actress and a painter but is better known for being one of the first to develop designer blue jeans

Last month, in an intimate video tour of his office with fellow 'AC360' reporter Vladimir Duthiers, the 'silver fox' joked that he wasn't always grey haired.



He said: 'I started with Flock of Seagulls brown hair, then evolved into the gray ghost that I now appear'.

The two colleagues also showed off Mr Cooper's wall-mounted collages of press passes that the star anchor had collected over his 20-year career.



They showcased his first press pass, which they said Mr Cooper and friends had 'faked' and 'forged' shortly after he graduated from Yale University.

Then and now: Anderson Cooper, who said, 'What's a little bit alarming about seeing all these press passes is it's basically just watching me age over the years'

He said: 'I started out of college with a fake press pass, I went to a war.'

He then showed off his legitimate press passes for subsequent years, from reporting trips to Bosnia, Croatia, Israel, Afghanistan, Indonesia, Cambodia and elsewhere.

Mr Cooper said: 'What's a little bit alarming about seeing all these press passes is it's basically just watching me age over the years'.

In a reflective moment, he said: 'I used to see people from CNN, like Christiane Amanpour, in vehicles, and I dreamed of one day having a vehicle in a war zone, or even a bullet proof vest...it was really stupid [not wearing one in conflict zones]'.

Mr Cooper also pointed to the collection of photos on a wall, many of the shots showing friends, family and scenes from his travels around the world.



He said: 'I think it's important to remember them and to honour them and to think about them, so I try to keep a lot of people's pictures up on the wall'.

He pointed to a picture of himself as a young boy in New Orleans with his father.



Father and son: Anderson Cooper, right, as a boy with his father, writer Wyatt Emory Cooper, who died of heart disease in January 1978 at 50

Tragic family: Young Mr Cooper and his heiress mom Gloria Vanderbilt, plus his older brother Carter, who killed himself at age 23 by jumping off the 14-story terrace of the family's luxury apartment

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