Gisele Caroline Nonnenmacher Bündchen[1] (born July 20, 1980) is a Brazilian model. According to Forbes, she is the highest-paid model in the world and also the sixteenth richest woman in the entertainment world,[2] having earned $33 million in 2007 and $35 million in 2008 alone, adding to her estimated $150 million fortune. She is also listed on Guinness Book of World Records as the world's richest supermodel. Bündchen has been the face of more than 20 brands internationally, and has appeared on more than 500 magazine covers.[3]
Gisele Bündchen was born in the Brazilian town of Três de Maio and grew up in Horizontina, Rio Grande do Sul, to Vânia Nonnenmacher, a bank clerk pensioner, and Valdir Bündchen, a university teacher and writer.[4] She has five sisters — Raquel, Graziela, Gabriela, Rafaela and her fraternal twin Patrícia, Gisele's junior by five minutes. Bündchen was raised as a Roman Catholic, speaks Portuguese as her native language, Spanish, and English.[5]
She is from South Brazil, a region whose population is largely composed of Brazilians of German descent. Bündchen is of distant German ancestry from both sides of her family: her great-great-grandparents immigrated to Brazil from Germany.