French Immersion

Model and actress Marilhéa Peillard’s considerable charms are winning her fans the world over

- By Louis Favelle

Léa “Marilhéa” Peillard puts her fingertips on the frame of the monitor and turns her head gracefully towards photographer Gilles Bensimon. She is dressed in thigh-high boots and a black miniskirt. He is wearing white corduroy trousers, a light blue shirt and a colorful scarf tied around his neck. Barefoot, with the camera in his hands, he directs the French model. The location is a photo studio reached from a small courtyard in Paris’s chic 7th arrondissement—a few minutes’ walk from the Eiffel Tower. This day in June the temperature has reached nearly 90 degrees, and inside the studio the fan is blowing.

“Gilles works fast and knows what he wants. I follow him on Instagram and he is a big name in the industry; so it feels awesome to have been photographed by him, especially for the cover of a major American magazine like Maxim,” says Léa after the shoot. From Gilles she got the same question that has followed her throughout her seven-year modeling career: “What are your origins?” Her long dark hair and tanned skin make one think of southern latitudes.