Chinese godmother of modelling talks about training supermodels and finally getting on the catwalk

Grace Han, commonly known as Auntie Han in China, has been an outspoken model coach and judge for almost three decades. In the past 10 years, she’s also become a fashion celebrity, social media voice and advocate.

The former Asia-Pacific head of Ford Models, also known as the “Chinese godmother of modelling”, has trained many of the industry’s biggest names in China. And with her looks, tall, lean figure, and remarkable skin at 72 years of age, she is often mistaken for a former model.

“I was actually kicked out of modelling school in Hong Kong as a teenager, for bad behaviour,” she says with a laugh, over a caviar breakfast at the Bulgari Hotel Shanghai’s rooftop restaurant.

Today, Han’s life seems gilded. She spends her weekends living in luxury at the Bulgari and weekdays at a Ritz-Carlton flat, and gets around in a baby pink London taxi. She’s often surrounded by a bevy of models she has trained.

Life was not always so comfortable for Han, who recalls a roller-coaster riches-to-rags-to-riches story over her seven decades. The daughter of a Shanghainese gangster, she worked on the machines in a Hong Kong garment factory before becoming a manager, and then migrated to Toronto, Canada, where she established her own factory. She moved back to China to work in fashion in 1989.

“Models must be curious and willing to learn,” she says, scrolling through her phone to show before and after photos of those under her wing.