New York is a magnet for aspiring young models, many of them Russian. But only a few manage to get their teeth around the Big Apple, and the rest meet with locked doors, disappointment and exploitation.

Zhenya left Russia for Las Vegas when she was nineteen to become a dancer but a back injury forced her to abandon her dream career.

For the past seven years, she's been a New York model.

“It’s a scary world. Girls want to reach the stars and a fascinating life. They try hard, but for many it just doesn’t happen – there’s competition and nobody really needs you at all. Sometimes the disappointment is immense – and you need something to go to when that happens,” she says.

Michael Gross, the best-selling author of a book called 'Models. The Ugly Business of Beautiful Women' echoes Zhenya's opinion.

“The problem is that below that tiny number of the few girls who are going to make a fortune, there are dozens, hundreds, thousands of girls who are never going to make a living. What they represent is raw meat for the machine that loves to chew them up and spit them out as sausage,” summarised Gross.

After working as a full-time model for 5 years, Alyona became an interior designer and moved to New Jersey with her dog Zhuk.

She says another harsh reality of the modeling business is drug abuse.

“Every 3rd photographer I came across did drugs. The models too. Others chose alcohol to be relaxed during a photoshoot,” Alyona told our correspondent.

Alyona says anorexia is also common, because models feel pressure to reach “size zero” to do the catwalks, and often dieting and exercise just isn’t enough.

During her five years as a model, Alyona admits she was also subjected to several unwanted sexual advances. She counts herself as one of the lucky ones.