Gisele Bündchen

"Gisele" redirects here. For other uses, see Giselle (disambiguation).

Gisele Bündchen
Gisele Bündchen in 2010
Born	Gisele Caroline Bündchen (1980-07-20) 20 July 1980 Horizontina, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil
Nationality	Brazilian
Spouse	Tom Brady (2009–present)
Children	Benjamin Rein Brady (b. December 9, 2009)
Modeling information
Height	1.80 m (5 ft 11 in)
Hair color	Light Brown
Eye color	Blue
Agency	IMG Models
Website	www.giselebundchen.com.br

Gisele Caroline Bündchen (Portuguese pronunciation: [ʒiˈzɛli ˈbĩtʃẽ]; born 20 July 1980) is a Brazilian fashion model, occasional film actress and goodwill ambassador for the UN Environment Programme.

In the late 1990s, Bündchen became the first in a wave of Brazilian models to find success. In 1999, Vogue magazine dubbed her "The Return of the Sexy Model" and she was credited with ending the "heroin chic" era of modeling.

Bündchen was one of Victoria's Secret Angels from 2000 until 2006. Since 2004, she has been the highest-paid model in the world and the sixteenth richest woman in the entertainment industry (as of 2007) with an estimated $70 million fortune. Models Claudia Schiffer and Naomi Campbell have argued that Bündchen is the only true remaining "supermodel" and according to Forbes she may become the world's first ever billionaire supermodel.

In June 2011, Forbes magazine estimated that Bundchen's total earnings over the last 10 years have passed the $250 million mark.

As an occasional actress, she had supporting roles in Taxi (2004) and The Devil Wears Prada (2006).

From 2000 to 2005, Bündchen was in a much-publicized relationship with American actor Leonardo DiCaprio. She married New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady in 2009.

Family and early life

Bündchen was born in the Brazilian town of Três de Maio and grew up in Horizontina, Rio Grande do Sul. She is of German heritage 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, Bündchen's junior by five minutes. Bündchen speaks Portuguese as her native language. She also speaks Spanish and English. She commented "I was born in Horizontina, a town in the back-country of (Brazilian) state Rio Grande do Sul. The town was once mainly colonized by Germans. In the school which I attended, learning German was actually obligatory from third grade on. But being out of touch with the language for such a long time, I unfortunately forgot it...] I belong to the sixth generation of my family in Brazil.

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, 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. After that, back to Brazil, she moved to São Paulo and begin a very successful modeling career in the country, shortly after that becoming one of the best paid models in Brazil. By 1995 she started to travel abroad for her first international assignments. In 1996, Bündchen had her first important New York City break at Fashion Week.

Modeling career

Vogue editor Anna Wintour crowned her the "model of the millennium," that same year Vogue called her "The return of the sexy model". Rolling Stone declared her "The Most Beautiful Girl in the World" in 2000 and Vanity Fair published an article titled "...And God Created Gisele" in 2009.

Bündchen pioneered the "horse walk", a stomping movement created when a model picks her knees up high and kicks her feet out in front.

In 1997 Bündchen traveled to London, where she auditioned for 42 shows. She got her big break when chosen for her ability to walk in towering heels—on a slippery runway—for Alexander McQueen’s memorable spring 1998 “rain” ready-to-wear show. Echoing similar accolades for Elle Macpherson a decade earlier, McQueen dubbed Bündchen "the Body", immediately boosting her bookings.

In 1998, she posed for Missoni, Chloé, Dolce & Gabbana, Valentino, Gianfranco Ferré, Ralph Lauren and Versace campaigns. In addition, she made the cover of the French edition of Vogue, and Cult fashion magazine i-D also added her on its cover, profiling "A Girl Called Gisele."

An article on Vogue magazine's on-line encyclopedia of models stated "As the year 2000 approached, Gisele Bündchen was the world’s hottest model, opening up a new category in the popular imagination: the Brazilian bombshell." By the year 2000, her going rate was reportedly already up to $7,000 an hour.

She is the fourth model in history to grace the cover of Rolling Stone, in which she was named "the most beautiful girl in the world", in 2000. Also that year "Time magazine said she was "one of the few runway models whom straight men can name."

She appeared on the cover of Vogue in July, November and December 1999. She won the VH1/Vogue Model of the Year for 1999, and a January 2000 cover gave her 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 600 magazine covers throughout the world. A total that is only second to Princess Diana's.

By 2000, her record breaking $25 million contract with Victoria's Secret helped solidify her status as the world's top model. She has been on numerous book covers such as "MaRIO DE JANEIRO" by Mario Testino and Russell James Retrospective book.

In 2000, she opened the spring Marc Jacobs, Michael Kors, Dolce & Gabbana, Christian Dior, and Valentino shows in New York, Milan, and Paris. From 1998–2003 Bündchen was in every Dolce & Gabbana fashion campaign, totaling 11 consecutive campaigns with the brand. In 2006–2009, she returned as the face of the brand's fragrance titled "Dolce & Gabbana The One".

Bündchen was invited to host the Brazilian version of the reality-show "America's Next Top Model" in (2003), but she refused. According to her sister and public relations manager, Patricia Bündchen, she did not want to pursue a career on television.

Photographed by Steven Meisel, she was presented on the September 2004 cover of American Vogue as one of the "Models of the Moment". 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 Bündchen lived there.

Fashion Rio Inverno 2006

In February 2007, Bündchen returned to the Milan runway by opening and closing Dolce & Gabbana’s show. She was chosen by Time magazine in 2007 as one of the 100 most influential people in the world. In September 2007, Bündchen was featured on the cover of Vanity Fair’s style issue, photographed by Mario Testino being one of the best sellers that year.

On 26 August 2008, the New York Daily News, in a list, named Bündchen the fourth-most-powerful person in the fashion world. On 12 May 2009, The Independent, called her the biggest star in fashion history. In 2010, she made Vogue’s best-dressed-of-the-decade list for her 2008 and 2009 Met gala appearances as well as her bikini-clad, logo-tattooed appearance in a 2000 fashion editorial. In April 2010, she was photographed for the cover of American Vogue for the 11th time. In September 2010, she lead a pack of top models for Vogue’s Fashion’s Night Out runway show at Lincoln Center, in New York. She then made a surprise appearance on Balenciaga’s runway, closing the show.

She is ranked No.1 as the Top Model Icon of All Time at models.com. She is also No.1 on the Money Girls list and #2 on The Sexiest Models list. In 2011, CEOWORLD Magazine ranked her among their Top Accomplished Women Entertainers. She was also ranked number 95 in FHM magazines 100 Sexiest Women in the World 2011.

In 2007, Bündchen was named "The World's Richest Supermodel". She ranked #45 in the 2011 FHM Australia list of "100 Sexiest Women in the World". In 2011, Men's Health named her one of the "100 Hottest Women of All-Time", ranking her at No. 25. In October 2011, Gisele made a surprise runway appearance during Paris Fashion Week, closing the Givenchy spring-summer 2012 fashion show.

In 2011, she graced a total of eight Vogue covers, more than any other model or celebrity that year.

Nude photographs

On 11 April 2008, a black-and-white photo of Bündchen, shot by Irving Penn, was auctioned for US$193,000 (£96,000). The picture was one of dozens from the collection of Gert Elfering that were sold at Christie's International in New York. Bündchen's picture reached the highest price in comparison with the others.

Image inspiration

In 2000, Bündchen was dubbed the "Boobs from Brazil" by tabloids who went as far as to blame her for the 36,000 breast enhancement surgeries performed that year in Brazil.

In 2006, Elle magazine bosses surveyed the American leading stylists and asked them to name the star whose hair is a favourite for their clients. More than 50 percent gave Bündchen the title of best hair in Hollywood.

In February 2008, research results were publicized by The International Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgery (ISAPS) to reveal how world celebrity images, which overwhelm popular media, influence people's choices and decisions to undergo plastic surgery. The question asked was "What influences do celebrities have on the decisions patients make?". The survey was sent to more than 20,000 plastic surgeons in 84 countries. Bündchen was among the most frequently mentioned celebrities. Bündchen won the abdomen and hair categories and took second place in the breasts category.

On January 2011, Bündchen came in first in the most desired female body on the 14th Annual Famed Hottest Looks survey, compiled by Beverly Hills plastic surgeons Dr. Richard Fleming and Dr. Toby Mayer. Even after giving birth in December 2009, her body was the most requested by the doctors' patients.

'Different body types are represented on the list because most women are shaped differently and want to look naturally beautiful,' explained Dr. Fleming. 'Some women want the lean look like Gisele [...]'

In 2011, AskMen.com revealed their Annual "Most Desirable Women" list of which Bündchen along with Angelina Jolie and Beyoncé Knowles being the only women to make the list every year for ten years in a row.

For New York Fashion week in fall 2011 for the Tibi Spring/Summer 2012 fashion show, the designer explained "The inspiration is taken heavily from the ‘90s—a freshly scrubbed Gisele from the pages of Vogue—clean, crisp, sporty looks and relaxed styles you want to live in."

Endorsements and earnings

• After C&A Brazil hired Bündchen as a spokesmodel and began airing television commercials, sales increased by 30%.
• In 2001, Bündchen launched her own line of flip-flop sandals, Ipanema. In three years, sales topped $30 million, with a portion of proceeds going to green causes. Forbes put her 53rd on their 2007 list of the most powerful celebrities. Ipanema made an estimated £152 million with over 250 million pairs sold in 2010.
• Gisele told Vitals Magazine in 2005, Business and Investing in Real Estate have been her hobbies since she was 18 years old. Since age 18 she has acquired real estate in New York, Los Angeles and São Paulo. She claims modeling is only 40% of what she does and the rest is contracting.
• On 1 May 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 previous 12 months, Forbes magazine named her the world's top-earning model in the list of the World's 15 Top-Earning Supermodels.
• American economist Fred Fuld developed a stock index to measure the profit performance improvement of companies represented by Bündchen compared with the Dow Jones Industrial Average. According to Fuld, the Gisele Bündchen Stock Index was up 15% between May and July 2007, substantially surpassing the Dow Jones Industrial Average which was up just 8.2%.
• By 2008, with annual income now topping $35 million, she continued to dominate the Forbes list of the world’s highest-earning models, and appeared on the magazine’s list of the Top 20 Richest Women in Entertainment.

Photo of Bündchen

• During 2009–2010, she was reportedly the top earning supermodel, earning an estimated $25 million.
• In 2010, she retained the top spot as Forbes’s highest-earning model, with a take-home pay of $25 million.
• In 2010, Bündchen introduced her own skin care product line, named Sejaa Pure Skincare.
• In early 2011, P&G's Pantene shampoo sales exploded 40% in Latin America after Bündchen started representing the product.
• Edward Razek, chief marketing officer of Limited Brands, who worked with Bündchen during her Victoria's Secret career says, "She's an international icon who can also move product—from shampoo to couture."
• The Lingerie Brand "HOPE" increased turnover by 40% after contracting Bündchen as its representative.
• Bündchen currently owns a hotel in Brazil, land in Brazilian city Trancoso, a villa in Costa Rica, a house in Brentwood, California, and she is currently building a home in Santa Monica.
• On May 2011, Forbes ranked her, for the fifth consecutive time, as the world's top-earning model with an estimated $45 million over the past 12 months (2010–2011). Her earnings climbed $20 million over the previous year, thanks to an economic boom in her homeland of Brazil coupled with a 10% surge in the value of the Brazilian real against the dollar.
• In August 2011, Bündchen ranked 60th on the Forbes List of The World's 100 Most Powerful Women. She ranked 3rd on the The 20 Youngest Power Women of 2011 List at age 31.
• Gisele and husband Tom Brady were named by Forbe's magazine as the World's Highest Paid Celebrity couple in 2011. With combined annual earnings at $76 million even beating out the likes of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie and Beyonce and Jay-Z.
• November 2011 Fred Fuld an American Economist who tracks companies Gisele represents since 2007, reported that she is still outperforming the Dow.

Other ventures

Charity activities

In 2006 Bündchen became the face of American Express Red, part of the Product Red initiative to send a percentage of monies earned from the financial transactions of this credit card to Africa's HIV/AIDS victims. In 2009, she appeared in 30 covers of the international issues of Elle magazines wearing (Product) Red clothing and posing with products from companies who support the same cause. Bündchen has also supported a variety of environmental causes, including clean water initiatives, environmental sustainability, and preservation of South American rainforests. In addition, Bündchen has helped raise money for cancer research and treatment, victims of Hurricane Katrina, and the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami.

On 20 September 2009, she was designated Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

Every year Gisele chooses a charity, to which proceeds of sales from her sandals are donated, with the 2011 donation going to ISA - the Socio-environmental Institute.

November 2011 Gisele made a surprise visit in Boston, MA to a group of teenage girls who were all patients at the Jimmy Fund Clinic at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute for a day of fun. The supermodel spent time with each and every girl, posing for photos and teaching them how to strut their stuff.

Gisele was recognized as one of the most charitable celebrities in 2011 by The Giving Back Fund, which added her to their list of celebs who made the largest donations to charity according to public records.

Nairobi, 12 January 2012 On her first official visit to Africa, UNEP Goodwill Ambassador and iconic face of fashion, Gisele Bündchen, went to the grassroots level in Kenya to experience the reality of energy poverty and to see how Kenyans are transforming their lives by accessing sustainable energy.

Acting career

In 2004, Bündchen played the bank robbers' leader, Vanessa, in the 2004 remake Taxi. In 2006, she played a minor character in The Devil Wears Prada. She was also a cameo in the Apple computer advertising campaign opposite Justin Long and John Hodgeman as a Mac iMovie.

Personal life

From 2000 to 2005, Bündchen was in a relationship with American actor Leonardo DiCaprio. In 2004, Bündchen and DiCaprio made People's annual Most Beautiful Couples List.

In December 2006, she began dating New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady. On Thursday, 26 February 2009, Bündchen married Brady in a small Catholic ceremony at St. Monica Catholic Church in Santa Monica, California. On 5 April 2009, the couple remarried in a larger ceremony in Costa Rica, with Brady's son (whom he had with actress Bridget Moynahan) present. However, several writers have begun pointing out that Brady and the Patriots, despite great success in the regular season, have not won another Super Bowl since Bündchen and Brady began dating,[4] and at least one colmnist for the Business Insider has suggested that the relationship may be cursed, as Brady (who was 3-0 in Super Bowls before leaving the mother of his first child for Bündchen ) has failed for five straight years to win another NFL championship.[5] Sports of Boston speculates that "the Giseld Jinx" came along just in time to replace the Curse of the Bambino.[6] A Facebook page has been started for the "Gisele Bündchen curse".

In December 2009, Bündchen gave birth to a boy in Boston, named Benjamin Rein Brady; his middle name is in honor of Bündchen's maternal grandfather Reinoldo.

Bündchen caused controversy when she told the magazine Harper's Bazaar that breastfeeding should be a "worldwide law", but later moderated her comments on her blog, stating, "my intention [was to] make a comment about the importance of breastfeeding".

External links

• Official site
• Official Youtube
• Gisele Bündchen at IMDb
• Gisele Bündchen at Fashion Model Directory
• The Many Faces of Gisele Bundchen – slideshow by Life magazine