Klum was born in Bergisch Gladbach, North Rhine-Westphalia, West Germany. She was raised by her parents, Günther (a cosmetics company executive) and Erna (a hairdresser) According to Klum, "in 1991, my friend, Karin, persuaded me to fill out a magazine coupon: I enrolled for the national contest 'Model 92', with the chosen winners shown on Gottschalk, a top German television show, sort of similar to late night shows with David Letterman or Jay Leno in the United States." Out of 25,000 contestants, Klum was voted the winner on April 29, 1992 and was offered a modeling contract worth US$300,000. She accepted the contract a few months later after graduating from school and decided not to try for an apprentice position at a fashion design school. Heidi has two brothers, thirty year old twins John and Dylan, and one sister, sixteen year old Jessica.
Modeling and Acting
Klum has been on the cover of most of the well-known fashion magazines, including Vogue Magazine, ELLE and Marie Claire. She became widely known after appearing on the cover of Playboy and for her work with Victoria's Secret. She has been a spokesmodel for McDonald's, Braun, H & M, and Liz Claiborne, among others. She is currently the latest celebrity spokesmodel for Jordache. In addition to modeling, she has appeared in several TV shows, including Spin City, Sex and the City, and Yes, Dear. She had a role as an ill-tempered hair model in the movie Blow Dry, played a giantess in the movie Ella Enchanted and was cast as Ursula Andress in The Life and Death of Peter Sellers. She also had cameo appearances in The Devil Wears Prada and Perfect Stranger.
In July 2007, having earned an estimated $8 million in the previous 12 months, Klum was named by Forbes as third in the list of the World's 15 Top-Earning Supermodels.
Klum guest-starred on How I Met Your Mother (episode: "The Yips") on November 26, 2007 with her fellow Victoria's Secret supermodels (Adriana Lima, Selita Ebanks, Marisa Miller, Miranda Kerr and Alessandra Ambrosio).
Project Runway
In December 2004, she became the host and judge of the reality show Project Runway on the U.S. cable television channel Bravo, in which fashion designers compete for the opportunity to show their line at New York Fashion Week and receive money to launch their own fashion line. She received an Emmy Awards nomination for the show for each of the first three seasons
Designing and Perfume
Klum has designed her own clothing lines (including one for infants) that were featured in the German mail-order catalog "Otto." She also has designed shoes for Birkenstock, jewellery for Mouawad, and swimsuits – featured in the 2002 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue – that, for a limited time, were available for sale through her personal website. She was one of the designers of the Victoria's Secret lingerie line "The Body", which was named after the nickname she received following her first Victoria's Secret Fashion Show appearance. Her Mouawad jewelry collection debuted on the cable shopping network QVC on September 14, 2006, and 14 of the 16 styles sold out after only 36 minutes. A second line of her jewellery collection debuted on QVC on April 14, 2007, with similar success.
She has produced two fragrances, called "Heidi Klum" and "Me", which are currently available for sale through her official website.
She was also involved in the development of a namesake rose, the Heidi Klum rose, which is available in Germany.
Germany's Next Topmodel
Germany's Next Topmodel is a German reality television show which pits contestants against each other in a variety of competitions to determine who will win a modeling contract with IMG. Klum is the host and co-producer of the show along with model Tyra Banks. The first season or "cycle" of the show was won by Lena Gercke and the second cycle was won by Barbara Meier.
