Anna Nicole Smith’s daughter enters modeling spotlight at age 6

Anna Nicole Smith’s daughter, Dannielynn Birkhead, is following in her mom’s footsteps as a model for Guess — and to some, the image of the 6-year-old child as the face of Guess Kids is a bit jarring when juxtaposed against Smith’s sultry ads from 20 years ago.

But don’t fret, says dad Larry Birkhead. This is Dannielynn’s first modeling foray, and she’s only doing it for fun and as a means of honoring the mom who died when her daughter was just 5 months old.

“Dannielynn has always looked up to her mom’s image and said that her mom’s an angel,” Birkhead told “Good Morning America” on Tuesday, “and I think that this is kind of Dannielynn’s way of paying tribute to her mom in her own special way.”

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Guess creative director Paul Marciano said in a statement that on set Dannielynn has the “same playful spirit that her mother had,” noting that having a second-generation Guess girl is a first for the brand.

Said Birkhead, a photographer: “To see her mom’s picture next to hers as a Guess girl and say, ‘Hey, I was a Guess Kids girl, my mommy was a Guess girl,’ that might be her only connection with her mom.”

Smith accidentally overdosed on prescription drugs in 2007 after a tumultuous career as a model and reality-TV personality. Birkhead and Dannielynn now live in Kentucky.

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