‘Fake Moss’ Denise Ohnona has revealed she didn’t know who Kate Moss was when first told as a teenager that she bore an uncanny resemblance to her.
The 43-year-old Moss lookalike spoke candidly about being compared to the 50-year-old supermodel in an interview this morning.
It comes as Denise stormed the runway at the Marine Serre Womenswear Fall/Winter 2024-2025 show on Monday.
While Kate was launched as a fashion superstar as a teenager, Denise has only been modelling professionally for the past six years after enduring a traumatic car collision at the age of 18 that left her with lasting scars.
Speaking on BBC Radio 4 this morning, Denise said she didn’t consider herself beautiful or a model in her younger years.
She said: ‘I think from the age of 14 was when I was first told I looked like Kate, but I didn’t really think much of it because I didn’t know who Kate Moss was at the time.
‘We didn’t have Google. It wasn’t until later on I found out who she was and when I first saw her I was like oh my gosh she’s gorgeous I am nothing like Kate.
‘I never considered myself beautiful or a model or anything like that.’
Kate Moss’ uncanny lookalike Denise Ohnona stormed the runway at the Marine Serre Womenswear Fall/Winter 2024-2025 show on Monday
Kate Moss attends the Saint Laurent Womenswear Fall/Winter 2024-2025
Kate is pictured, left, at the Bottega Veneta Winter 24 show in Milan, Italy, last month, while Denise is seen, right, at Paris Fashion Week
Denise grew up on Penny Lane in Liverpool, made famous as a result of The Beatles song of the same name.
She grew up with three siblings, one sister and two brothers and had a ‘happy childhood’ with her mother and stepfather.
At the age of 18, Denise was involved in a traumatic collision with a double-decker bus.
She said: ‘My face took the brunt of it and smashed into the windscreen. The next time my mum saw me in the hospital my face was cut all open. It was really traumatic.
‘It took me a long long time to get over that as well as the physical scars, I was mentally traumatised and it did hold me back for many years.’
She recently told The Times how the doctor who operated on her had not been trained in plastic surgery and she endured the effects of surplus collagen production and thick scars.
As she struggled with what she described as ‘a mental breakdown’, her weight plunged to five and a half stone and she suffered stomach ulcers.
She later spent some time living in America, in Orange County, where she worked in telecoms and got married in Las Vegas – but she and her husband divorced in 2011.
Denise, pictured, has told how being compared to Kate Moss helped her recover after her divorce
Kate Moss is seen here leaving an Yves Saint Laurent after-party
She has said she gained weight after becoming depressed and losing interest in going to the gym – only to become inspired to get fit again by people pointing out her resemblance to Kate Moss.
Denise has her own Instagram account called @iamnotkatemoss, with 67,400 followers, in which she replicates famous catwalk appearances and adverts by Kate Moss.
Denise previously told Mail Online: ‘When I split up with my ex-husband eight years ago, I went a bit ‘mumsy,’ I lost my sense of fashion and gave up on the gym.
‘I would look after the kids day and night and it was more important to run around after them than look after myself. Then I started getting people mistaking me for Kate Moss when I would go anywhere.
‘Being told that I could look like Kate Moss picked me back up and I started focusing on myself again. I got back into the gym and looking after my appearance and the comments started all over again!’
Talking about abuse and trolling she receives on social media, Denise told the BBC: ‘Most days I’m ok with it but you do get people who want to dissect you, pull you apart, and make assumptions about you and I’ve got to say 99 percent of people have been so lovely and supporting, but there’s always that one percent who go out their way to put you down.’
Denise’s likeness to Kate is regularly highlighted both in public and on social media
Kate Moss is seen her modelling John Galliano in Paris in October 1993
During her appearance in Paris on Monday, Denise harked back to Kate’s indie days in an oversized leather jacket emblazoned with the brand’s crescent moon-shaped logo with a matching handbag.
She wore heavy black eye make-up while her trademark dirty blonde locks were worn in loose waves to add to the indie ensemble.
Denise’s Instagram posts have included miming to the sound of Moss’s testimony at Johnny Depp’s court case battle with Amber Depp.
She has also been photographed in the window of a McDonald’s, playing on Kate’s famous quote suggesting ‘Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels’.
Despite her lookalike work, she describes herself as a full-time mum to daughters Elise, 13, and eight-year-old Anais.
Denise said: ‘When I first started to get papped, I used to get very shy and felt like a fraud became I am a Fake Moss.
‘But then as time went on I started to enjoy it and now find it very flattering – who wouldn’t want to get mistaken for Kate Moss? She’s one of the most incredibly iconic women ever!
Denise shared images and videos from her fittings on Instagram, where she goes by the handle ‘I Am Not Kate Moss’
The real Kate Moss, pictured here, has also been at this year’s Paris Fashion Week – here attending the Saint Lauren Womenswear Fall/Winter 2024-2025 show last week
‘I get mistaken for her on a daily basis now – especially when I am out in central London – that’s where the paps tend to find me.
‘However even members of the public get us confused, and I get asked to pose for selfies in nightclubs and in the supermarket all the time.
‘It’s amazing that I’ve been able to find something that has transformed me from my frumpy mum lifestyle, to a glamorous “supermodel”.’
‘Fake Moss’
From: Ormskirk, Lancashire
Age: 43
Denise Ohnona grew up and lives in Ormskirk, Lancashire
Height: 5ft 4in
Weight: 105lb/48kg
Dress size: 6
Career: Worked in a Liverpool branch of Next, then on the docks checking containers and filling out forms
Denise worked as a retail assistant at Next in Liverpool after leaving school
Instagram followers: 67,400
Children: Elise, 13, and Anais, eight
Denise is pictured here with daughter Elise, who is now 13
Love life: She married her husband in a Las Vegas chapel but they got divorced in 2011 and she now lives with her partner of ten years, a music producer named Robert
Denise lives with her family in Ormskirk in Lancashire, 13 miles north of Liverpool
She is frequently stopped in public by locals
Setbacks: She suffered severe scarring after being thrown through a car windscreen in October 2008 after the vehicle driven by her then-boyfriend collided with a bus
Clothing: Denise says she gets most of the clothes she wears to model as ‘Fake Moss’ from charity shops such as Oxfam and on eBay
Denise is seen preparing for her runway appearance for Marine Serre this week
From: Croydon, south London
Age: 50
Croydon-born Kate Moss now has a 10-bedroom mansion in the Cotswolds
Height: 5ft 7in
Weight: 121lb/55kg
Dress size: 8
Career: Supermodel since the age of 14, she also now promotes her own wellness brand Cosmoss
Kate’s wellness brand Cosmoss had a debut event at Harrods in September 2006
Instagram followers: 1.6million
Children: Lila, 21, also a model
Kate Moss, right, is seen here with daughter Lila at a Paris show in January this year
Love life: Married to musician Jamie Hince between 2011 and 2016; ex-boyfriends include actor Johnny Depp and Dazed and Confused co-founder Jefferson Hack, father of her daughter
Johnny Depp and Kate Moss dated between 1994 and 1998
Jefferson Hack, left, is the father of Kate’s model daughter Lila
Setbacks: She was dropped from some fashion campaigns in 2005 after pictures were published appearing to show her snorting campaign
Clothing: Kate has modelled for brands including Calvin Klein, Stella McCartney, Chanel, Dior, Louis Vutton and Dolce and Gabbana
Kate was 17 when she advertised Calvin Klein jeans in 1992