A model falls during the Karl Lagerfeld show in Paris on Wednesday. (AP)

Paris, Oct. 4 (AP): German designer Karl Lagerfeld, who famously lost 42 kg on a strict diet, today dismissed a controversy about underweight fashion models as “grotesque”, saying countries such as France have more of a problem with obesity than with anorexia.

Lagerfeld sent out crop- ped tunics and skinny jeans in his spring-summer coll- ection for his eponymous label, which has moved back to showing in Paris after a season in New York.

Lily Donaldson, one of the crop of size zero models who have been criticised for encouraging young women to diet obsessively, stepped out in a slinky navy jersey dress with bands looped about the body.

Asked about his body-skimming creations, Lagerfeld said: “It’s good discipline. You know, in France there are 18 per cent of girls overweight between 25 and 15, so I mean, that’s a lot, that’s unhealthy too, huh?”

Asked what he though of the tabloid storm about skinny models, Lagerfeld replied: “Grotesque.”

He defended the fashion industry’s use of very thin models, saying the new crop of girls — many of them eastern Europeans — were naturally slender.

“You know, anorexia we don’t see. The girls are skinny, they have skinny bones. They are very very tight, they are tighter than ever, but that’s all,” he said, referring to their narrow frames.

The designer last year revealed the secrets of his weight loss regime in The Karl Lagerfeld Diet, a book co-written with his doctor, Jean-Claude Houdret.

In the book, Karl Lagerfeld confesses that his motivation for losing weight was not health but vanity — he wan-ted to fit into the ultra-slim suits made fashionable by Dior menswear designer Hedi Slimane.