The Victoria's Secret Fashion Show debuted in 1995, and, over the years, it's acted as
a career high for countless models.
But wearing wings isn't a forever thing.
So where do models go when they've reached the end of the runway?
Here's what former Victoria's Secret models look like today.
Helena Christensen began her career as a Victoria's Secret model in 1997, but as Insider reported,
she was only with the company for two years.
According to her 2018 interview with Media Entertainment Arts World Wide, Christensen
went on to grace the covers of over 600 magazines throughout her 30-year career.
She also had a memorable part in Chris Isaak's music video for his 1989 single "Wicked Game."
After the runway, Christensen turned to photography.
Not long after, she and artist/designer Camilla Stærk founded New York design studio Stærk
& Christensen.
She told the media outlet,
"I had the best teachers in the world as part of my career, it was like having the most
wonderful photography education anyone could have."
Christensen is still incredibly comfortable in front of the camera, though.
In 2018, she posted a photo of herself in the same metal outfit she wore in 1991.
In 2009, Marisa Miller donned one of the "most memorable Victoria's Secret Fashion Show looks
of all time," according to E! News.
By 2013, she had made her feature film debut in R.I.P.D.
While not the most well-received film ever, it did give the former For Him Magazine "Sexiest
Woman in the World" a chance to stretch her wings, both with acting and stunt work.
The self-described "tomboy" told Interview Magazine that year that the physical aspect
of filming R.I.P.D. was her favorite part.
"I have to say the most uncomfortable part is the push-up bra I'm wearing, so I'm all
good.
Ladies, we have it rough."
Forbes reported on Miller's business endeavors in 2010, which included an endorsement deal
with Harley Davidson as well as a collaboration with Surftech.
As she's gotten older and started a family, Miller has made it a point to be honest about
herself and her body, particularly on social media.
She told Interview Magazine,
"There are more important things in life than a six-pack, I realized.
It was just so much more important to take care of my baby and take care of myself in
a healthy way."
Molly Sims may have only walked in a single Victoria's Secret Fashion Show, in 2001, but
the former model has transformed a career on one stage to another: a soundstage.
In 2003, she landed a starring role in Las Vegas as Delinda, the manager of a casino.
Sims also appeared in several comedic films, but she hasn't relegated herself to just work
on the big and small screens.
She's created an affordable and chic jewelry line for the Home Shopping Network, and she's
also an author, having penned two books as of 2019: 2015's The Everyday Supermodel and
2017's Everyday Chic.
Sims has made it a point to be honest about the pressures of aging.
In 2015, she spoke with Elle about being a spokesperson for CoolSculpting, a non-invasive
fat-freezing procedure.
She said,
"So many people don't admit everything they've done.
They've had face lifts and Botox and Juvederm and Restylane and lasers and liposuction and
all these things.
Listen, for me it was an easy thing to do."
Appearing on the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show runway in the '90s, Veronica Webb enjoyed
a career with the retailer for two years, but her impact on the fashion industry has
been everlasting.
Vogue described her as, quote, "one of the original '90s supermodels," who's gone on
to do work as a spokeswoman, columnist, and entrepreneur.
In 2017, Webb launched her own website, WebbOnTheFly.com, where she shares tips and personal stories
on all things beauty, fashion, and lifestyle.
She told Vogue that her motivation for creating the site stemmed from wanting to show others
that age has nothing to do with confidence, saying,
"To share everything I've learned in three decades as a model and how that translates
beautifully into everyday life as a wife and a mother."
In the early 2000s, Petra Nemcova had a hugely successful career that included modeling for
Victoria's Secret and landing the cover of Sports Illustrated.
Everything changed in 2004, however, when the model and her fiancé were caught in the
Boxing Day tsunami in Thailand.
Her fiance lost his life in the disaster, but Nemcova survived, having hung onto a palm
tree for eight hours.
"The tsunami has given me many gifts, and one of them is to have this consciousness
of how lucky I am."
In a 2018 interview with Buro 24/7, Nemcova described how she came out of the tragedy
with a new perspective, saying,
"The most amazing gift we can give to anyone is the power of intention and the power of
focusing on positivity.
When I was in the hospital, I didn't know whether I was going to walk.
I said, 'If I cannot walk, I still have my arms, I have my eyes, I can see, I can hear,
there are so many things to be grateful for.'"
These days, Nemcova is focused on her own non-profit organization, All Hands And Hearts,
which merged with the Happy Hearts Fund.
Their goal is to help support communities that have faced disaster.
"Every year we choose a different country where we work and rebuild schools after natural
disasters."
Since 2006, the organization has rebuilt over 162 schools in ten countries, including the
U.S., Thailand, and the Philippines.
In 2013, the Daily Mail revisited the illustrious modeling career of Victoria's Secret model
Bridget Hall and described her '90s heyday by saying,
"By 18, she was listed in Forbes as one of the top ten money-making supermodels, along
with Cindy Crawford and Christy Turlington."
Hall famously dated Leonardo DiCaprio back in 1994, a pairing that featured the actor's
first of many model girlfriends, according to Elle.
Although no longer considered to be the moneymaker she once was, Hall's modeling career has seen
a resurgence.
In 2013, Hall became the face of two separate ad campaigns: one for Rag & Bone's D.I.Y.
campaign and the other for Prabal Gurung's fall collection.
The designer told The New York Times that he wanted a model to represent his customer,
saying,
"We've grown up with this fantasy about supermodels.
I felt personally it was the right moment to celebrate women of that age."
Rebecca Romijn also walked the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show during her modeling career.
She began the transition to acting in the late '90s, but her role in 2000's X-Men catapulted
her into film fame.
In a 2002 interview with IGN, Romijn said she prefers to pass on typical pretty face
roles, adding,
"I mean, playing somebody who's perfect holds no allure for me, whatsoever.
It's just boring.
I'd rather play somebody who's a little broken."
After a failed marriage to John Stamos, Romijn found true love with Jerry O'Connell in the
2000s, but it took some serious, well, flexing on his part.
According to People, a shirtless O'Connell impressed Romijn at a Maxim Hot 100 party
in Las Vegas by showing off his bod.
Two kids later, Romijn and O'Connell are still madly in love.
Or they're keeping it together for the kids, a thing they joked about with Closer Weekly
in 2019, when O'Connell said having twins keeps them from divorcing.
Rebecca added,
"Because then one of you will be stuck with them.
So you decide to stay together so one of you doesn't end up with them!"
Even in 2019, People described Claudia Schiffer as the biggest model of the '90s.
She walked in only one Victoria's Secret Fashion Show runway, in 1997, but has modeled for
countless others.
Three decades after she began her modeling career, Schiffer is still a force in the industry.
In 2017, she spoke with Vogue about the release of her book, Claudia Schiffer, as well as
her thoughts on the current state of the modeling world.
She described the fast pace of the current times, saying,
"I've read some interviews where models are described as 'supermodel of the moment.'
You have to work so much harder, I think, in comparison."
She told People that she's always down to try new things, at least as far as fashion
goes, which probably has a lot to do with her ability to remain relevant.
Josie Maran started her modeling career at 12, and it wasn't long before she was modeling
for Victoria's Secret and Sports Illustrated.
By 18, she had landed a ten-year contract with Maybelline.
Maran wanted makeup that was healthy, but she came up against makeup artist after makeup
artist who told her it couldn't be done.
In 2007, Maran started her own cosmetics line that focused on high-end and healthy products,
celebrating the process of aging.
She told Into the Gloss,
"It's about embracing who you are and getting better with age."
For Maran, getting older is about embracing the journey, as well as the lines it leaves.
She added,
"I'm not going to get Botox, I'm going to gut this one out.
I'm pretty hardcore, so I'm going to see what life is like without all that stuff."
As one of the most iconic Victoria's Secret models, Stephanie Seymour enjoyed all the
perks of life as a supermodel during the early '90s.
In 2014, Harper's Bazaar revisited her early days, which included a starring role in Guns
N' Roses' "November Rain" music video, as well as a brief dating stint with the band's
frontman.
Seymour said of that time in her life,
"The thrill of the whole rock 'n' roll thing wore off.
I saw the worst of that world and it soured me."
After retirement, she enjoyed a seemingly picture-perfect family life with billionaire
husband Peter Brant and their kids.
Her life looked to be idyllic until a 2016 DUI charge led to speculation that things
weren't as glamorous as Seymour would have hoped for them to appear.
Page Six also reported on the model's alleged history of drug and alcohol abuse, as well
as the couple's alleged infidelity throughout the course of their marriage.
Everyone deserves a comeback story, though, and for Seymour that happened in 2019 when
she was chosen to close the Versace runway.
Karen Elson appeared in only the 2001 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show, a turn that seemed a
little out of character for the model/musician, who described herself to Vogue UK in 2019
as:
"That off-kilter beauty that nobody would think was beautiful but then you see it in
that magazine and it's something."
Her atypical looks have allowed her to morph into so many people, she said, but modeling
isn't the thing that's fed her soul over the years.
In 2010, Elson released her debut album, The Ghost Who Walks.
It was a critical success, and, by 2017, she released the EP Double Roses.
It was heavy and emotional, something Elson told Elle was easily, and incorrectly, attributed
to her 2013 divorce from Jack White.
She's also been one of many voices heard in the Me Too movement.
According to People, Elson posted her own traumatic experience dealing with musician
Ryan Adams.
In an interview with Wylde, former Victoria's Secret model Olga Kurylenko said she remained
in the industry for ten years, just long enough for her to star in her first feature film,
The Ring Finger, and to achieve the acting success that would allow her to quit the modeling
world.
By 2008, she was a bonafide Bond Girl, having appeared in Quantum of Solace.
From there, the actress landed lead roles in two separate, decidedly non-Bond films,
Oblivion and To the Wonder.
She also produced 2011's Land of Oblivion, a disaster film that she described to Fade
In Online in 2013 as, quote, "amazing, a work of real poetry and beauty."
Kurylenko later used her own experience in poverty as fuel for her contributions to Hope
and Homes, a non-profit that works to move children out of orphanages and into loving
homes, regardless of their level of wealth.
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