Modelling dynasty heir keeps it real
Cindy Crawford’s daughter opens up about her meteoric rise to stardom
Six months ago, you might have been forgiven for not knowing the name Kaia Gerber.
Now, however, with campaigns for every major fashion brand from Alexander Wang and Chanel to Omega and Valentino — not to mention 3.6 million followers on Instagram — well, if you don’t know Kaia Gerber, you simply haven’t been keeping up.
In fact, with her current follower count, Gerber has now bypassed her mother, supermodel Cindy Crawford, in the number of online fans on the app.
But, despite the fact their combined follower count (a total of 6.9 million) outnumbers the populations of the Greater Toronto Area and Vancouver, Gerber says the pair enjoys a normal mom-andteenage-daughter relationship. “Like a lot of people my age, what your mom tells you, you don’t really listen to,” Gerber says. “I think there are lessons that you just have to learn on your own.”
Like most teenagers, she’s happy to live each day to its fullest and not overthink the future.
“I don’t think most 16-year-olds know what they want to do with their life,” she says. “I definitely want to finish school, and then I guess we’ll see what happens.” In this sense, Gerber is a very normal teen in that she is about to start her senior year of high school, which she’ll do online, due to her work and travel schedule.
But in nearly every other sense, she’s far from a ‘normal teen.’ Her first modelling job was for a Young Versace campaign when she was 10, followed by her first magazine shoot at 13, for the December 2014 issue of Teen Vogue. From there, things went a bit quiet — until last September — when Gerber made her runway debut, walking in nearly 30 shows over the four major fashion weeks. Since then, she’s walked the couture shows, been on the covers of French and Italian Vogue, worked with famous fashion photographers such as Steven Meisel, Peter Lindbergh, Mario Sorrenti, Willy Vanderperre and dozens others. Gerber has also become an ambassador for Omega, alongside her mother and her older brother, Presley.
“It’s a dream job,” says Gerber of the last year.
“You get to travel and meet people from all around the world, experience things you wouldn’t normally get to.” Speaking to Gerber, it’s easy to forget that she’s only 16. Perhaps it’s good media training; at an Omega event in Berlin, she greets hundreds of international press and influencers and chats with CEO Raynald Aeschlimann with the ease of a seasoned hostess. Perhaps Gerber’s maturity is also down to her parents, Crawford and Rande Gerber, who have been married for 20 years and love nothing more than some old-fashioned family time at home in California and at their cottage in Muskoka. “I admire how down to earth my mom is — just seeing how graceful she is and how kindly she treats people and how professional she is,” says Gerber.
“And my dad has shown me how to live life in the moment and to not take anything for granted. Family time is important to Gerber, and in fact, the importance of downtime is one of the biggest lessons she’s taken away from her first year of model stardom.
“I’ve learned how to appreciate being home and sleeping in my own bed,” she says.
“My all-time favourite place is where I grew up in California, when we all get a chance to come back together — that’s my favourite time.”