Patty Owen
Patty Owen, born June 18, 1959 to a blue-collar worker and homemaker in a poor suburb outside of Boston, moved at age 9 with her family to Amherst, MA for a better life. When Patty started modeling in 1979 to pay college fees, some of her high school class mates of 1977 were far from… Read More »
Lena Kansbod
For John Casablancas, an Italian restaurant in Stockholm was Schwab’s Drug Store, and a high school girl checking coats was Lana Turner. “You know, you could be a model,” said Casablancas, the founder of Elite Model Management and the firm’s chairman of the board, to the tall 17-year-old with long brown hair and piercing blue-green… Read More »
Rene Russo
Born in 1954, Rene Marie Russo grew up on the wrong side of the tracks in Burbank, a Los Angeles suburb. Her father, a sculptor and mechanic, left the family when Rene was just two, leaving her mother, Shirley, as a single mom with two daughters. (Rene has one sister, named Toni). In Junior High… Read More »
Margaux Hemingway
Margaux Louise Hemingway was born in Portland, Oregon, February 16, 1955, and was the older sister of actress Mariel Hemingway and the granddaughter of writer Ernest Hemingway. Hemingway was named for the wine, Château Margaux, which her parents, Puck and Jack Hemingway (eldest son of Ernest), were drinking the night she was conceived. In addition… Read More »
Isabella Rossellini
Isabella Fiorella Elettra Giovanna Rossellini (born 18 June 1952) is an Italian actress, filmmaker, author, philanthropist, and model. Rossellini is noted for her 14-year tenure as a Lancôme model, and for her roles in films such as Blue Velvet and Death Becomes Her. Rossellini is the daughter of Swedish actress Ingrid Bergman and the Italian… Read More »
Rosemary McGrotha
Rosemary McGrotha was born November 8, 1958 in Tallahassee, Florida. McGrotha was the antithesis of the conventional rail thin fashion model. A voluptuous brunette with piercing blue eyes, she broke the model stereotype and reigned in a category all her own, and was one of the most sought after models for more than a decade…. Read More »
Wanakee Pugh
Before Vera Wang became a national symbol for creativity and success, she was a talented and spirited fashion editor for Vogue Magazine. In 1981 she began featuring a new face in her glamorous editorial pages. Today artist Wanakee Pugh credits Ms. Wang for giving her a tremendous start that launched a successful twenty-year modeling career…. Read More »
Michelle Stevens
Top cover girl of the 70s, Michelle Stevens-Childs, has a new attitude: “All the glamour and fame that came with modeling was so exciting to me in my early 20s, but eventually I felt I had to get a real life. So I got married, moved to the country, had two kids and started my… Read More »
Eva Voorhees
Eva Voorhees, born in Los Angeles, California, established a reputation in the late seventies and the eighties as one of the most captivating models of her time. With her soft, romantic face, deep green eyes and full lips, Eva’s Pre-Raphaelite appearance was unique in the fashion industry. Eva started modeling out of high school in… Read More »
Brooke Shields
Brooke Christa Camille Shields (born May 31, 1965) was born in New York City into a well-known American society family with links to Italian nobility. Her grandmother was the Italian princess Donna Marina Torlonia. Her father, Francis Alexander Shields, was a businessman, and her mother, Teri Shields (née Maria Theresa Schmonn), managed her career. Shields… Read More »
Anette Stai
Karen Anette Stai, born March 24, 1961, is a Norwegian model. She won the first “Face of The 80s” contest for the Ford Model Agency, and was one of the top models of the 1980s. Stai was an editorial favorite, working often with American Vogue, Italian Vogue, German Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, Elle, Mademoiselle, Cosmopolitan, Elegance…. Read More »
Bitten Knudsen
Bitten Knudsen was a Danish-born model who did most of her high fashion work from 1977-1982. With her striking white-blonde hair, she was a favorite of Glamour magazine, Bazaar and Cosmopolitan, and was often featured on their covers. She worked with many of the era’s greatest fashion photographers: Helmut Newton, Francesco Scavullo, Albert Watson, John… Read More »
Gia Carangi
Gia Carangi was an American fashion model during the late 1970s and early 1980s. Carangi, who was of Italian, Welsh and Irish ancestry, was considered by some to be the first supermodel. Gia Carangi was also the first to present unusual poses, facial expressions and gestures. She is credited by many at the upper echelons… Read More »
Anne Bezamat
Anne’s international modeling career was launched when she was discovered at age twelve and a half, and she grew up surrounded and nourished by designers, photographers, and artists such as Karl Lagerfeld, Donna Karan, Jean-Paul Gaultier, Christian Lacroix, Irving Penn, Francesco Scavullo, Hiro, Patrick Demarchelier and Andy Warhol, just to name a few. During that time… Read More »
Christie Brinkley
Christie Brinkley (born February 2, 1954) is an American model best known for her three appearances on the cover of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue in the late 1970s and early ’80s, for her long-running contract with CoverGirl and for being the ex-wife of musician Billy Joel. Brinkley has also worked as an actress, illustrator,… Read More »
Janice Dickinson
Janice Doreen Dickinson (born February 15, 1953) is an American model, fashion photographer, actress, author and agent. By the 1980s, she was considered a supermodel in the fashion industry, and later expanded her profession to reality television by judging for four cycles on America’s Next Top Model. She subsequently opened her own modeling agency, which was documented as The Janice Dickinson Modeling Agency…. Read More »
Nancy DeWeir
At age 15 (1978) Nancy DeWeir was discovered by ad exec Vincent Teschetti ( Vice President of BBD&O) while traveling on the Long Island Rail Road with her mother to have dinner in the city with her father, who worked in the Twin Towers. After being turned away by Wilhelmina, Stewart and Zoli modeling agencies,… Read More »
Christina Ferrare
Cristina Ferrare (born February 8, 1950 as Cynthia Cristina Ferrare) is a former fashion model, actress, author and television talk-show host. Born in Cleveland, Ohio, she was 14 years old when her family moved to Los Angeles, California, where her beauty landed her a contract with a major modeling agency and then with 20th Century… Read More »
Nancy Donahue
Nancy Donahue (born 16 February 1958) is an American fashion model and actress. The daughter of a noted lawyer and a philanthropist mother, Donahue grew up in Boston, Massachusetts. While attending Lasell College in Wellesley, Massachusetts, she was discovered by Mademoiselle magazine after winning a modeling competition. She appeared in the August, 1978 edition and… Read More »
Peggy Dillard
Peggy became a model as the result of being a student, as she explains. Her career took off in a very uncanny way, without a portfolio or an agent. Preparing for shows as a student, she would visit many of the showrooms in the fashion district, and the designers would ask her to do their… Read More »
Jacki Adams
In the 1980′s, Jacqueline worked in Manhattan as one of the world’s top models. As a Ford Model, Jacki Adams worked with photographers Irving Penn, Richard Avedon, Arthur Elgort, Francesco Scavullo, Patrick Demarchelier, Hiro, & Albert Watson. Five of those years were spent as the exclusive face for Elizabeth Arden Cosmetics. Jacqueline Florine.com Jacki Adams-SMI