In my opinion, there's nothing inherently racist about attributing a thing to its place of origin. If it were being used in a way that disparaged people of Chinese (or whatever) descent, that's different. I don't think that's how it's being used in this instance, though.

I would think it depends on what you're referring to. If it's something like a car, then Chinese model seems appropriate and equivalent to Japanese model, Korean model, ... If it's a person, then you might be on less-firm ground, but if they're a model, and they're from China, I'm not sure what else you can say short of "they're a model who's from China"?

EDIT: what was Richard Feynman? An American Physicist? Is it tangled up with gender, or is our concern merely tangled up.

Chinese isn't just an ethnicity, it's a country.

no because Chinese refers to a country, not a race...on the other hand, asian models...