Lisa D'Amato of America's Next Top Model Seriously Injures Face in Freak Accident

These are not photos for her model portfolio – or for the feint of heart.

Lisa D’Amato, who won the all-star cycle of America’s Next Top Model in 2011, is recovering from a freak accident that broke her nose in several places and lacerated her forehead, lips and chin.

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D’Amato, 32, posted graphic pictures on her Facebook and Instagram pages of her cut and swollen face from the accident last week in a Colorado hotel after she wrapped filming of an indie movie called Cowboys and Indians.

“We were just kind of monkeying around,” she tells PEOPLE, explaining that she was doing a handstand up against a crew member when they suddenly took a nasty tumble.

D’Amato landed on her face, crushing her nose, and then the crew member fell on top of her, causing more scrapes to D’Amato’s face.

“It was a totally freak accident,” D’Amato says. “It wasn’t like we were doing back flips off the balcony.”

She was rushed to the emergency room, then sent to another hospital where a plastic surgeon went to work on her nose.

“I didn’t have the best nose in the world to begin with. It gave me character,” she jokes. “Now I have a nice little nose job. I get a super cute nose.”

Throughout the ordeal, she says, she cracked jokes to put other people at ease – “Everyone seemed so sad,” she says – but when left quietly alone, “I looked at my hands. They were covered with blood. That’s when I thought, ‘Oh, my God, what did I do to myself?’ Of course, I started crying.”