‘I was the world’s highest paid male supermodel while trapped in a cult’
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‘No one joins a cult, because joining is implying there’s informed consent. It’s more about seduction.’
In the 1980s and 90s, several major names ruled the modelling industry, including Naomi Campbell, Iman, Linda Evangelista and Cindy Crawford.
However, Hoyt Richards has a unique title, as he’s widely regarded as being the ‘world’s first male supermodel’. At the peak of his stardom, he was the highest-paid male model in the industry.
Rising to fame in the mid-80s after graduating from college, he modelled for brands including Versace and Ralph Lauren, counted peers such as romance novel model Fabio Lanzoni as his friends, and brushed shoulders with A-listers at the legendary Studio 54 in New York.
What fans might not have known was that behind the scenes, he’d been swept up into Eternal Values, a community led by the manipulative Frederick von Mierers that promised to send its followers down a spiritual path of enlightenment. Freddie also claimed to have had an extraterrestrial ‘walk-in’ experience, meaning that an alien had supposedly taken over his human form.
At the time, Hoyt was adamant that he hadn’t – and would never – join a cult. Years later, he realised the truth. He had been in a cult all along.
Hoyt (born John Richard Hoyt) met Freddie in 1978 when he was 16 while on a beach in Nantucket, Cape Cod. He was charismatic, addressing the teenager as though he was an adult, and making him feel special as he spoke to him about topics such as religion and the balance of the universe.
Freddie had a magnetism that drew people in, especially those seeking meaning and connection in their lives. Hoyt’s venture into modelling, a suggestion from Freddie, came at a crossroads while he was at college, when a shoulder injury had forced him to give up American football.
He found his mother too controlling, and he and Freddie had developed a friendship when they’d stayed in contact during the summer breaks.
‘I’ll never beat myself up for what I signed up for, because I think even at 16, to consider the fact that maybe I could approach my life on a more spiritual basis, there’s nothing wrong with that,’ he tells Metro.
‘It just took me 20 years to figure out that’s not what it was, and that wasn’t any fault of myself, in the sense of being too naive or gullible. It was just not knowing certain elements were at play that I didn’t even know existed.’
Hoyt, 64, escaped the cult in 1999 and has since become a public speaker in the hopes that he can help prevent others from being seduced by cults, and provide guidance to families whose loved ones are trapped.
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Content retrieved from: https://metro.co.uk/2026/07/10/i-worlds-highest-paid-male-supermodel-trapped-a-cult-29098299/.
