GQ magazine named her “the most beautiful girl in the world” and Paul Marciano himself described her looks as “sheer perfection.” Having appeared on over 500 magazine covers and on catwalks around the globe, Claudia Schiffer is one of the most famous supermodels in the world.

The eldest of four children, Claudia was born on August 25, 1970 in Dusseldorf, Germany, inheriting “her fathers nose and her mother’s lips.” Growing up in Rheinerg, she practiced ballet and piano and dreamt of following in her father’s footsteps and attending law school. At 17, she was discovered by a modeling agent in a German disco where she was celebrating a friend’s birthday.

With her parents at her side, Claudia flew to Paris for an initial test shoot and made her modeling debut in Elle magazine. In 1989, she became famous playing the GUESS? Girl in a series of sexy print campaigns shot by Ellen von Unwerth. The ads brought her to the fashion forefront and she appeared simultaneously on five U.S. magazine covers and seven European covers.

Despite her supermodel status, Claudia leads a simple life. She says, “I don’t drink, I don’t do drugs. My only bad habit is that I love chocolate.” She owns a pastel colored duplex in Monaco that overlooks the Mediterranean, keeps apartments in New York and Paris, and owns property on the Spanish island of Mallorca. She likes to read, dance, attend Broadway shows, ski, and ride horses. Claudia is also an avid painter, who frequently visits the local art galleries in the countries she visits.

Highlights in her career include becoming the first model to grace the covers of Rolling Stone and Vanity Fair, being the first and only model to have her wax likeness in the Grevin Museum in Paris, and opening the now-closed Fashion Café in 1995 with fellow supermodels Elle MacPherson, Christy Turlington and Naomi Campbell. In addition, she has a yearly swimsuit calendar, a series of exercise videos, a Barbie® doll created in her likeness, and a published autobiography, Memories.

When she’s not working on one of her numerous modeling contracts, Claudia focuses on her acting career. She made her film debut in The Blackout and appeared in the movies Friends and Lovers and Black and White. Claudia continues to volunteer for terminally ill children, a cause she has advocated since the start of her modeling career.

In May 2002, Claudia married film producer Matthew Vaughn in a small ceremony in Lawshall in Suffolk, eastern England. The couple welcomed their first son, Caspar, in January 2003. Previously, Claudia was involved in a six-year high profile engagement to magician David Copperfield.

Claudia remains a prominent figure in Germany where she recently presented the winning bid to host the 2006 World Cup. With a net worth once listed at $55m, it is estimated she may be the wealthiest German woman of her generation.