By Helen Reid
LONDON, Oct 27 (Reuters) – AI-generated fashion models present a tantalizing opportunity for brands: the ability to create lifelike images for their retail websites while cutting costs by 90% or more compared to photo shoots with human models.
For the modeling industry, the technology poses an existential threat because of scant regulation governing the ownership or use of digital twins. Fashion models face the risk of unpaid replication of their image – or replacement by entirely synthetic models.
To understand how AI is upending the economics of fashion modeling, Reuters interviewed 15 model-agency directors and reviewed more than a dozen confidential photo-shoot contracts in which brands including Diesel, Calvin Klein and L’Oreal detailed proposed terms for AI-created alterations and future use of the images.
The companies’ contract requests included the right to swap a model’s face with another using AI; the creation of a digital clone with no additional compensation to the model; and the right to use images of a model’s body to train AI. The terms in the unsigned contracts also included broad legal language that could effectively give a brand leeway to use AI however it wanted.
While some companies are looking to repurpose or modify images of existing models, others are using fully AI-generated models, not based on existing humans.
As AI use expands, modeling agencies are seeing bookings decline, photo studios are closing and models are facing the loss of a chunk of their livelihoods: photo shoots by fast-fashion retailers constantly adding new collections to their websites.
“Within a year, even the next six months, there’s going to be less jobs for models, especially our bread and butter, which is ecommerce,” said Adot Gak, a model based in London who has been on the cover of Harper’s Bazaar and appeared in campaigns by brands including Balmain and H&M. “If we don’t speak up about this, in the next two years the whole industry will just be bots.”
While some fast-fashion players like Spain’s Mango have already rolled out AI-generated models at scale, high-end brands are moving more cautiously. Moncler experimented early with an AI-generated campaign in 2023, and Gucci caused controversy in fashion circles when it posted images generated by AI on Instagram this year.
Moncler said it does not currently use AI-generated models, either on its website or in its campaigns. Gucci did not respond to requests for comment.
“The scariest part is that now people cannot differentiate between a real model and an AI model,” said Gak.
FACE SWAPS AND ‘DIGITAL TWINS’
AI allows retailers to endlessly rework and redeploy a model’s image wearing different outfits at a fraction of the cost of new shoots.
“Some brands ask to modify faces, bodies, skin, age or expressions after shoots using AI. Others are asking about creating ‘digital twins’ of models that they can reuse later without needing another production,” said Patrick Staal, owner of modeling agency Uniko Models in Barcelona.
In a photo-shoot casting sheet, Italian brand Diesel asked models to agree to “alteration or reconstruction of facial features and body proportions,” along with “swapping of faces among the participating models,” and “superimposition of the Participant’s face onto another person’s body.”
Diesel’s parent company OTB told Reuters the model release was drafted for a specific campaign and isn’t representative of its typical agreements. It said it doesn’t systematically modify models with AI.
Reale Actives – the skincare brand launched this year by social-media personality Alix Earle – uses the tagline, “Reale you is perfect you.”
But in a contract seen by Reuters, the brand asked for rights to create AI-generated replicas of models and to “own” and use these fakes for a year without further compensation.
Reale Actives said in a statement that it uses real models and hasn’t replicated any model using AI. It said the contract language came from a partner production company, which it declined to name.
MODELS TRAINING THEIR MACHINE REPLACEMENTS?
In some cases, models are helping to train their replacements: some contracts’ fine print includes language allowing the use of their images to train AI tools.
A Calvin Klein draft contract seen by Reuters asked the model to accept, for no extra pay, that the brand “may use reasonably unrecognizable images of Model (no identifying features such as Model’s face, scars, tattoos or otherwise) to train and fine tune AI tools for learning general model attributes.”
A Calvin Klein spokesperson said in a statement: “Like many others, we are testing and learning in this fast-moving space,” adding that the brand’s AI use is guided by regulation, industry standards and respect for models’ rights.
In many cases, contracts include wording such as “including” or “not limited to,” which lawyers commonly use to claim rights that aren’t spelled out.
Melanie Howard, partner and chair of luxury brands at law firm Loeb & Loeb in Los Angeles, represents both brands and talent in contract negotiations and said such sweeping language “is dangerous in its ambiguity” and makes it difficult for models to challenge any unsanctioned use of their images.
In a photo-shoot contract seen by Reuters, France’s L’Oreal asked for “the right to use artificial intelligence (AI) technologies… including for the purpose of modifying, enhancing, or adapting the appearance of cosmetic products, packaging, or shades, as well as for retouching purposes.”
Without addressing that contract language, L’Oreal said it uses standard AI tools in post-production and editing that don’t affect the model’s image.
‘WE ARE SAVING SO MUCH MONEY’
Some firms are openly embracing AI to replace models and save money.
Europe’s biggest online-fashion retailer, Zalando, has rapidly adopted AI-generated imagery for marketing content – and shut both its photo studios in Berlin last year. Fast-fashion retailer About You, which Zalando acquired in July last year, also closed its studio. Overall, Zalando cut more than 340 jobs, though the company said it retained some of those employees in other roles.
Now, About You is launching its Scayle Studios business, which creates digital imagery for other retailers using AI-generated models and promises a more than 90% production-cost reduction. Scayle has 130 brand clients and has generated 190,000 outfits in the last month, according to a company spokesperson.
“We are saving so much money,” said Julian Jansen, vice president of marketing at About You. “You’ve always had this super fast world of ecommerce, and this super slow traditional world of photo shoots, it didn’t fit together in any way – and now with AI, it’s a completely different scale.”
LITTLE REGULATION
Regulations globally haven’t kept pace with the threat to models’ livelihoods, but the New York State Fashion Workers Act is one exception. The law has made it illegal since June 2025 for brands to create or modify replicas of models without their explicit consent.
“The misuse of models’ images is not new, but with AI that problem is accelerated tenfold,” said Sara Ziff, founder and executive director of the New York-based nonprofit Model Alliance, which backed the legislation.
Ziff, herself a model for years, pushes for similar laws in other states and federally.
The British Fashion Model Agents Association has drawn up an AI code of practice, including that AI can only be used with the consent of a model, who would own any digital twin. But BFMA head John Horner said that without binding regulation in Britain or Europe, models still risk being taken advantage of by less scrupulous agents.
“A lot of young talents don’t fully understand the long-term consequences yet,” said Staal, the Barcelona-based model agency director. “Signing away AI rights at 20 years old could still affect someone ten years later.”
(Reporting by Helen Reid, editing by Anna Driver and Lisa Jucca)
