MIAMI – A South Beach modeling agency whose young image-setters once starred in an MTV reality show has closed its doors, the victim of an ailing economy.
For more than two decades, agent Irene Marie has represented top models including Florida native Niki Taylor, whose career she helped launch.
Now, Irene Marie Models has become a symbol of a sickly economy. It laid off its last six employees Friday and will allow models to pick up photos and other materials this week during limited hours.
“I’ve committed my life, over 25 years to this industry, my career, my models, my employees,” Marie told CBS 4, a local Miami news station. “To close down in this manner is not something I really would have hoped for.”
Marie moved her agency from Forth Lauderdale to South Beach in 1989 after seeing the city’s potential in the fashion industry. With that, she joined the first wave of investors to purchase and renovate an original ocean front building.
The 2006 MTV reality television show, 8th & Ocean, followed the lives of her young models and their relationship with Marie and her staff. Adding to her success, Marie, 58, received the key to the City of Miami Beach, and two days in 2007 and 2008 were declared as Irene Marie Day and Irene Marie Models Day in the city.
Joel Tabas, a Miami bankruptcy attorney who represents the agency, said Marie’s business revenues have dropped 90 percent in one year and she has been personally funding the company.
Tabas said they are working with former employees and models to “reconcile all of the monies we owe and what is owed to Irene, and then make proposals to them in the next two to three weeks.”
Last year, as more national and foreign advertisers cut back, many newspapers, magazines and modeling agents began feeling the pinch. Marie was forced to reduce her staff and let some models go. Marie realized things weren’t improving by the end of the year.
While a bankruptcy filing is being considered, Marie said she has no idea what’s next for her and is “taking it day by day now.”
