Gisele Caroline Bündchen (born July 20, 1980) is a Brazilian model and occasional film actress. According to Forbes, she is the highest-paid model in the world and also the sixteenth richest woman in the entertainment world, with an estimated $150 million fortune. Bündchen also acts as a goodwill ambassador for the United Nations Environment Programme.
Bündchen was born in the Brazilian town of Três de Maio and grew up in Horizontina, Rio Grande do Sul. She is of German descent from both her parents, Vânia Nonnenmacher, a bank clerk pensioner, and Valdir Bündchen, a university teacher and writer. She has five sisters — Raquel, Graziela, Gabriela, Rafaela and her fraternal twin Patrícia, Gisele’s junior by five minutes. Bündchen is Roman Catholic and speaks Portuguese as her native language. She also speaks Spanish and English.
Originally, Bündchen wanted to be a professional volleyball player and considered playing for the Brazilian team, Sogipa. While in school, Bündchen was so thin that her friends used to call her «Olívia Palito» (Portuguese for Olive Oyl, Popeye’s skinny girlfriend and «Saracura» (a type of Brazilian shorebird).
In 1993, a then-13-year-old Bündchen joined a modeling course with her sisters Patrícia and Gabriela at her mother’s insistence. The following year, Bündchen went to São Paulo on a school excursion to give them an opportunity to walk in a big city. In a shopping mall, while eating at McDonald’s with her friends, Bündchen was discovered by a modeling agency. She was subsequently selected for a national contest, Elite Look of the Year, in which she placed second — Claudia Menezes, from Bahia, took first place. Bündchen placed fourth in the world contest, held in Ibiza, Spain. In 1996, Bündchen moved to New York City to begin her modeling career, debuting at Fashion Week.
She graced the cover again in November and December of that year. She won the VH1/Vogue Model of the Year for 1999, and a January 2000 cover gave her the rare honor of three consecutive Vogue covers and in December 2009 she appeared alongside of her husband Tom Brady on the cover of book The World in Vogue – People, Parties, Places. In 2000, she became the fourth model to appear on the cover of the music magazine Rolling Stone, when she was named «the most beautiful girl in the world.»
Bündchen has been on the covers of many top fashion magazines including W, Harper’s Bazaar, ELLE, Allure, international editions of Vogue, as well as style and lifestyle publications such as i-D, The Face, Arena, Citizen K, Flair, GQ, Esquire, and Marie Claire. She has been featured both in the Pirelli Calendar 2001 and 2006 and in broader market publications such as Time, Vanity Fair, Forbes, Newsweek and Veja, more than 500 magazine covers throughout the world.
Bündchen consistently works with acclaimed photographers such as Mario Testino, Steven Meisel, Nick Knight, Mert and Marcus, Rankin, Annie Leibovitz, Karl Lagerfeld, Peter Lindbergh, David LaChapelle, Mario Sorrenti, Nino Muñoz and Patrick Demarchelier, and with renowned directors such as Jean Baptiste Mondino and Bruno Aveillan.
In the December 2005 issue, New York magazine chose and publicized a list of 123 reasons to love New York City with reason number 43 being that Gisele Bündchen lived there.
After childbirth, in 2010, Gisele was in the Shape issue of Vogue US. In the same year Roberto Cavalli signed up Gisele as the face of his Fall/Winter campaign, which also marks 40th anniversary for the designer’s label.
Claudia Schiffer said: «Supermodels, like we once were, don’t exist any more» and reckoned that Gisele Bündchen was the only one close to earning the supermodel title.
Naomi Campbell said: «Models need to earn their stripes – I just think the term is used a little too loosely. Kate Moss is obviously a supermodel but, after Gisele, I don’t think there’s been one.»
On August 26, 2008, the New York Daily News, in a list, named Bündchen the fourth-most-powerful person in the fashion world.
On May 12, 2009, The Independent, called her the biggest star in fashion history.
She is ranked #1 as the Top Model Icon of All Time at models.com. She is also #3 at the Money Girls list and The Sexiest Models.
Since her debut, Bündchen has been the face of a variety of advertising campaigns including several seasons of Christian Dior, Balenciaga, Mervyn’s, Dolce & Gabbana, Missoni, Versace, Givenchy, Bvlgari, Lanvin, Guerlain, Valentino, Ralph Lauren, Earl Jean, Zara, Chloé, Michael Kors, Louis Vuitton and Victoria’s Secret.
She has appeared in advertisements for Nivea lotion and is the face of several Brazilian brands including Vivo, Multiplan (Shopping Malls), Colcci, Credicard (Citibank) and Volkswagen do Brasil. After C&A Brazil hired Bündchen as a spokesmodel and began airing television commercials, sales increased by 30%.
In May 2006, Bündchen signed another multi-million dollar deal, this time with American giant Apple Inc.. She starred in an advertising campaign to promote the new Macintosh line through the Get a Mac advertisements. Also in 2006, Bündchen became the new face of Swiss luxury watchmaker Ebel.
She has her own line of sandals with footwear company Grendene called Ipanema Gisele Bündchen. Forbes puts her 53rd on their list of the most powerful celebrities of 2007 because of the international success of her shoe line, making the brand Ipanema the most sold Brazilian flip-flop in the world, surpassing the legendary Havaianas. Custom Ipanema flip-flops sell for as much as $230 a pair. She is also the owner of a hotel in the south of Brazil, the Palladium Executive.
On May 1, 2007, it was announced that Bündchen had ended her contract with Victoria’s Secret.
In July 2007, having earned an estimated total of $33 million in the past 12 months, Forbes magazine named her the world’s top-earning model in the list of the World’s 15 Top-Earning Supermodels.
Bündchen lends her support and image to a number of charities and humanitarian causes, such as the I am African campaign, in which she painted her face to protest the lack of attention given to Africa’s HIV/AIDS victims. Without receiving payment, Bündchen was, in 2006, the face of American Express Red Card, an initiative launched by U2 front man Bono and Bobby Shriver to send a percentage of monies earned from the financial transactions of this credit card to Africa’s HIV/AIDS victims.
In January 2010, Bündchen donated US$1,500,000 to relief efforts for the 2010 Haiti Earthquake.
On 20 September 2009, she was designated Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).
After relationships with actor Leonardo DiCaprio and professional surfer Kelly Slater, in late 2006 Bündchen began dating New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady.
On Thursday, February 26, 2009, Bündchen married Brady in a small Catholic ceremony at St. Monica Catholic Church in Santa Monica, California. On April 5, 2009, the couple remarried in a larger ceremony in Costa Rica, with Brady’s son with actress Bridget Moynahan present. For the April ceremony, Bündchen wore a dress and veil designed by John Galliano.
On June 19, 2009, People magazine reported that Gisele was pregnant with her first child with Brady, and that the baby was due on December 14. On December 8, 2009, Bündchen gave birth to a boy in Boston, but they had trouble choosing a name. On December 18, 2009, she posted a message on her website indicating that their new son’s name is Benjamin. In the April 2010 issue of Vogue magazine, she revealed that his full name is Benjamin Rein Brady and that his middle name is in honor of Bundchen’s father Reinoldo. Bündchen said that she only speaks Portuguese to her baby.