It was au revoir Amber last Friday night when the judges eliminated the leggy beauty from the competition, leaving nine girls remaining in the quest to become New Zealand’s Next Top Model.  We spoke to Amber about her time in the competition, and share some exciting news about the NZNTM final.

Amber expressed surprise at her elimination on last week’s episode of New Zealand’s Next Top Model, but with the benefit of hindsight she confesses that being eliminated wasn’t so bad.
 
“I was actually pretty happy to be at home when I did get home.”  

Since leaving the model house, Amber has returned to Otago Polytechnic to complete her certificate in fashion.  She began her course at the start of the year but had to put her studies on hold to appear on the show.  While a career in fashion appeals to Amber, pursuing modeling is still her top priority.
 
"I want to try and go international, that’s the next thing I’m heading towards.”  

Amber's modeling career began late last year when an agent in Dunedin “sort of chased me down for a while and eventually I gave in and found out I really like it.”

While she’s not new to the profession, Amber admits she still has a lot to learn about modelling. “I’m still learning everything, I don’t normally wear heels because I’m so tall.  Gotta learn to walk in those.” 

However, Amber believes that living in the house “wasn’t the best learning environment".  Not even her previous smidgeon of experience could prepare her and her fellow modelling novices for the daunting prospect of being thrown into photo shoots while feeling unprepared.
 
"It would have been nice to have some direction for that, because half of us had no idea what we were doing.  It is something you need to practice at to get good at.”  

Life in the model house, as we’ve heard, can be stressful, and as we’ve seen, one of the housemates has made the situation even tenser.  Yes, we're talking about Tyne.  Amber cites Tyne’s youth as a factor in the ongoing problems between her and the other girls, and also says “she wasn’t really bonding with anyone else, which would have been quite hard for her.”  After Friday’s allegations of bulimia, Amber acknowledges that “we were a bit worried about her but no one really knows what’s going on.”  

Watching the show each week along with the rest of the nation has allowed the girls to see a side of the competition that has remained a bit of a secret to them until now; judge’s deliberations.  While Amber thinks Sara was probably her harshest critic, she's noticed that Chris Sisarich “tends to stand up for me a bit, which is nice."  And of runway coach Colin Mathura-Jeffree, who lovingly and aptly nicknamed her 'a gentle giant', she says, “Colin says what he thinks, he’s quite funny."

Amber’s already ditched the short blonde crop she received in the makeover episode and gone back to brown as “bleach is pretty harsh on your hair. I’m all for natural, so I’m just gonna try and grow it out”.

Amber initially had some reservations about appearing on NZNTM, but now says she feels good about her participation on the show. “I was a bit worried about whether it was going to be embarrassing, but I think it ended up being good for me.”

While Amber may be gone, things are heating up even more in the competition with news today that the finale of New Zealand’s Next Top Model season three is going live!

The final episode will coincide with Fashion Week and air live on Friday September 2 at 7.30pm.  NZNTM Executive Producer John McDonald says he is excited to be collaborating with New Zealand Fashion Week.

“This is the first time in three cycles that the filming of NZNTM has coincided with New Zealand Fashion Week and it seemed the perfect opportunity for us to work together. It is something we have wanted to do since we started making the series.”