Fast confession - Renata Langmannová: I Model only on the Side, I Make my Living through ´Instant Miracles´
In 2006 she won what at that time was still a prestigious competition, Czech Miss. Since then Renata Langmannová is part of Czech showbiz. But she has lived through it for twelve years without any scandal. She has been with presenter Ondřej Novotný for ten years; year before last they got married. Although the beauty studied at the Police Academy of the Czech Republic, we will probably never see her with a weapon in her hand. But everyone anticipates her announcement that she is expecting an offspring. The model in an interview with Luxury Prague Life confided how she feels about bearing children and what it is she is currently engages her the most.
Renata, I did not see you in a while…
True, but nothing much has changed for me. Everything is great and I must say that the new year has started in a good way. As regards our work, me and my husband have notched up the pace a little, but it is true that in the last years it´s already been like that.
What is it then that you are engaged in now? Modelling?
Truth to tell, not that much. It is rather on the side. More like events for some consideration.
Why? Are you getting old or what is it?
It is certainly associated with it. But rather, I have matured mentally. I simply do not want to travel as much as before. In fact, for ten years I have lived out of my suitcase. And one gets fed up with that. It was a beautiful ten years, but I am a married woman now and I want to do different things. I want to be at home in the evening, watch television, or go out somewhere with my husband and so on. And most importantly I needed to move on with my career.
Married woman… it sounds as if you were old.
No. It only seems like that to you. But it is true that people address me as a lady and sometimes miss and of course that pleases me.
Well, you do modelling on the side, so what is it that you are engaged in, what is your work?
It is on the side, but I sometimes still go to Germany, Austria, Italy, to make some photos. In the Czech Republic I do things connected mainly with Instagram, it is really in right now, I mean business through Instagram. I cooperate with various companies, it is more of a commercial, celebrity-style modelling.
Otherwise, last year I founded a communications agency Cool Sisters with a friend, Lenka Matějková, and we do campaigns on social networks, that is our domain. Alongside that we do PR, production affairs, marketing strategies... we try individually approach in respect of the various companies. We advise them how to properly communicate and make themselves be seen.
Come on, you studied to be a policewoman, those fields are worlds apart?
You know how it is, you study something, but thanks to modelling I´ve had a demanding ´school of life´, I made many contacts and now I reap the benefits of that.
Will you never work as a policewoman? That is a pity.
(Laughter) I didn´t study in order to be a police officer. We mainly studied law and that it was is important to me now. I have a degree examination from constitutional, criminal and administrative law. That gave me a great base and I am still building on that. Life and business is all about law, nowadays you have a contract for almost everything.
Hey but I think that nowadays everyone does PR. Can you make a living from that?
We mainly do campaigns on social networks through influencers and celebrities. PR more like according to wishes of the client. But the usual scenario is that someone approaches us and then this establishes a further, different cooperation.
But you are right, there is a lot of similar agencies in the market, we but we are trying to do it differently, our way. As I have said before, we have unique contacts. We can devise, link and bring people together, create custom-made projects. We have recently encountered a fact that major clients who had previously hired large agencies are not satisfied with them. They lack individual approach and are of course quite expensive. They are not flexible or proactive as much. We do ´miracles while you wait´. It´s just the two of us or we hire people for certain individual tasks. We are both keen on the work, so far we don´t yet have children, so we are flexible too, and I think that we are also relatively creative.
You recently had a cookery show on TV with your husband, which you have also presented. How did this happen?
Well, this happened completely by chance. Ondřej is a presenter, I think currently one of the best. I have never pushed myself into presenting, it is not exactly my cup of tea. I am shy. But sometimes someone needs a couple, so Ondra presses me into it. And this was such a case. Together we presented an on-line Nova programme ´How about to order…´.
They chose us because they wanted a couple. It was a new experience for me. Recently we have been presenting things more and more often.
Your husband hosts the programme Robinson´s Island. Every time he leaves for two months. How do you cope with that?
Yes, he has been twice to the Philippines for something like two months.
Have you been with him?
No. At first I wanted to go, but then I found out all that it would entail… there are no conditions there for anyone to be visited by relatives. The entire team has very high work ethic. From morning they work away well into the night. After his return, Ondřej always talks about how demanding it is in there. He needs to concentrate on work a lot, he prepares the projects… for example he got up at five in the morning and went to sleep about one or two in the morning. It is a rough piece of work, moreover, it really is at the end of the world. Just getting there takes two days.
Do you not miss him when he is away?
Of course I do. But it is true that he always goes in the summer, and you can bear everything better then. There are a lot of activities you can do at that time. I always go on trips with girlfriends and I also work, so the time flies.
Renata, I simply have to ask now...
About a child, what? (laughter)
Yes, for several years now you´ve been telling me how you both want to work and work... Well and you just work, you have been together for so many years… the entire Czech show business is all tense up.
I know. Now we are really talking about it. (laughter) More than before. We want to have children but the question is when it will come. Several people ask me on daily basis. And my answer is that we want to have children.
Ondra already has a daughter, I have known her since she was seven. She is almost adult now. She is basically my friend. She lives with her Mum in France. She is a beautiful and smart girl. Ondra did well, I hope that we will also have such clever children.
Don´t you feel somehow under pressure?
I don´t admit it to myself. I don´t care. It is my life and I don´t feel to be of such age when it is too late, on the edge of the biological clock.
In addition, you told me that you are on a diet, it is not very compatible with pregnancy. Why on earth are you on a diet, you look great!
Thank you, but you know how it is. I´ve been exercising my entire life and I try always to be fit. It is not simple. I do not want to say that I cannot eat something, I enjoy almost everything, but then I work it off in the gym. Thank goodness that I least enjoy it. It charges me with energy. This morning I went for a training and I´ve been running around since then. Moreover for me a diet means that make an effort not to eat something for a couple of days, then I feel deprived, so I have some straight away. (laughter) But I simply think about what I eat. Carbohydrates and pastries and everything that´s been said that should not be eaten I eat really in moderation. But I love food as such.
What exercise do you enjoy the most?
I change it a lot. Now I am really into power training, because I have a personal trainer. I exercise twice a week with him and then I also have cardio on treadmill. When it´s warm I run outside. I had a period when I did Thai box, but now I don´t feel much like it. I have kind of waves, I get enthusiastic about something, then I stop to do it, then after a time I go back to it. But I always do something. I cannot imagine life without sport. In winter I also enjoy hot yoga.
Do you cook?
Sometimes, but it is not my hobby.
How long it´s been since you won the Czech Miss competition?
Twelve years.
Do people still make this association?
I think so. It is that kind of title, I will take that to my grave.
It that good or bad?
At the time I held the title of Miss, I experienced kind of waves. I have always been proud of the title, simply because not everyone has one, but there were times when it helped me and times when it was a bit of a burden.
After I won my career took of like a rocket, and without it I would not have been where I am at today. But when I began flying across the globe and do modelling jobs at international level, I wanted to be taken more as a model and break out of the Miss category. However, it was very difficult, fashion people still took me for the one that won the Miss. I have not been sufficiently about fashion, they looked down at me and didn´t let me take photos editorials for some magazines, because I had that ´Miss´ label. Even after years when I travelled and worked in different parts around the world. I had made campaigns, filmed advertising, cooperated with big brands. One time I felt really sorry. Today of course I don´t care any more.
But also at that time Czech Miss was an a different level. Over the last two or three years this competition experienced a huge downturn…
Yes, I find that the prestige of this title went down sharply.
Do you follow it?
From afar. I do not go to the finals of these competition, nor other events. I do not think that it is a label with which I would like to be associated.
Did you manage to keep some friends from that time?
Yes, I still keep in touch with some and I am always very happy to see them. We have many experiences in common and that will never change. But I am most friendly with Katka Sokolová.
You have also lent your face to the foundation of Tereza Maxová.
Yes, I have been working with her for many years. I am actually doing my own collection of design products Teribear by Renata. I am always involved in the design of the product. The collection includes for example bracelets, phone covers… every year we add one product. Charity as such is important to me. I also cooperate with the children´s haemato-oncology centre in Olomouc, It is a personal matter for me. I drive there to see them, I know everyone there personally… I am trying to help the children and the families individually, always when they really need something urgently I get the funds.
Why personal, do you have some experience with cancer?
Thanks to God, no. But I am from Moravia, from Ivanovice in Haná and I studied in Olomouc. The place reminds me where I come from. It is really near. Always, when I come there I feel as if on another planet. Here in Prague I see that people rather do their own thing and there those doctors and nurses would do anything possible for others. Sometimes I do not understand how they function, all the things they manage to do for the children and their families. And even though it is a struggle with fatal disease, it is a very positive place. I feel hope and happiness from small things there.
Do you feel more at home in Moravia?
Even here in Prague I feel at home. But it is difficult to say, I still have a family in Moravia, I love driving there. We have beautiful relationships. There is my home but I like it here in Prague very much. I always wanted to live here. I have an uncle here and I used to visit him when I was little. At that time I used to tell my parents that one day I will live in Prague or New York. (laughter)
