CINDY CRAWFORD
We catch up with the iconic supermodel
for some women, Kate Moss is the ultimate supermodel. For me, it has always been Cindy. She’s the reason I spent much of the 1990s in faded Levi’s 501s and black bodysuits, my backcombed roots forever clouded with Elnett in a vain attempt to achieve her voluminous mane. She was everything. And everywhere. On the cover of every magazine, abluting in George Michael’s Freedom! ’90 video, drinking a can of Pepsi in denim cut-offs, shaving k.d. lang on the cover of Vanity Fair, sashaying down the Versace catwalk with Linda, Christy and Naomi, and hanging off the arm of her Hollywood heartthrob then-husband, Richard Gere. She had curves (by model standards, anyway), unabashed glamour and a mole on her upper lip, which made her even more beautiful. Thirty years on, I am still enamoured. And Cindy is still in front of the camera, albeit more on her own terms now. She’s been an ambassador for Omega watches for 26 years and is also the face of her own direct-to-consumer beauty brand, Meaningful Beauty, with renowned cosmetic doctor Jean-louis Sebagh, and Cindy Crawford Home, a furniture collection available in US department stores. Interestingly, what both of Crawford’s personal business ventures have in common is that they are reasonably priced and readily available, perhaps a nod to her own ‘nononsense’ mid-west upbringing. She grew up in Dekalb, Illinois, and, before moving to New York at the age of 20 to pursue a career in modelling (she’d been runner-up in Elite Model Management’s Look of the Year contest three years before), had started a scholarship to study chemical engineering at Northwestern University. Of her beauty line, she says it was conceived for women like her mother, ‘who just used soap and water on her face’.
Indeed, there does seem to be a real pragmatism to Crawford. For all her privilege and smart business choices (her husband since 1998, Rande Gerber, is a nightlife entrepreneur, who also cofounded a tequila brand, Casamigos, with best pal George Clooney), most of her focus now seems to be on steering and supporting her family – her kids, Presley, 21, and Kaia, 19, have both followed in her modelling footsteps – and ploughing her energy into philanthropic endeavours.
Crawford and her two sisters, Chris and Danielle, lost their younger brother Jeff, who died of leukemia when he was three years old and Crawford was 10. She has supported the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society of America and recently started an initiative alongside the American Red Cross and American Cancer Society called Give Blood To Give Time, to raise awareness of the importance of giving blood to help cancer patients.
It probably goes without saying that I was thrilled Crawford agreed to appear on the cover of Red for a third time (the last was 18 years ago!). We caught up over Zoom – her looking pristine in gym gear, after a mid-morning workout in her Malibu home, me on my sofa in Ramsgate late one evening – to discuss lockdown life, owning your power and Kate Moss’s annoying burger habit.
SO, HOW WAS 2020 FOR YOU, CINDY?
Well, how I felt in May was different to how I felt in August. My kids were home for most of it [instead of travelling] and I felt incredibly fortunate because maybe they wouldn’t have been otherwise. It made me realise how grateful I was for my pre-covid life, but also this life, too – being at home, cooking and not being so busy. I’ve spent my entire career working in fashion, yet in the past year, I’ve just bought leggings, sweatpants and a new pair of sneakers, because what else do we need?
I HAVE A WARDROBE OF CLOTHES I DON’T WEAR BUT JUST GAZE AT WISTFULLY.
I was doing that today as I was putting on my Ugg slippers and looking at my high-heeled shoes. I was thinking, ‘I don’t even know if my feet will want to go back in them again!’ But that’s what resetting will be, right? We can choose what was good from that life and what is good from this life, and create a new one.
A YEAR AGO, YOU WROTE ON YOUR INSTAGRAM THAT YOU’D BEEN ‘RESETTING, RECHARGING AND LIVING IN THE MOMENT’. WHY DID YOU FEEL THE NEED TO DO THESE THINGS AT THAT TIME?
I think I was specifically referring to my relationship with Instagram. I come from a generation that didn’t have social media and I was definitely a latecomer to it. I wasn’t a big Facebook or Twitter person, so when Instagram came along, I thought, ‘Oh, this is pictures. I get this!’ It’s a chance to present my version of myself – not the lens a photographer sees me through, or even your lens, with this interview. But it also feels like feeding a beast and I didn’t want it to be burdensome. I didn’t want to miss moments of living by trying to document everything. Kaia gives me some advice, such as telling me hashtags aren’t ‘a thing’ any more! Her generation seems to have more fun with it, too – they’re less bothered about perfectionism.
I CAN’T IMAGINE YOU EVER EXPERIENCE COMPARISON ANXIETY FROM IT.
No, because I understand how I use it – if I haven’t washed my hair in four days and have spilled something on my T-shirt, I don’t post myself in that way. I love Celeste Barber, because she humanises fashion, but that’s not how I choose to present myself. I grew up in the modelling world, where you take 100 pictures and you edit it down to that one perfect one, and that’s the one everyone sees – not the 99 outtakes, where your eyes are closed or there’s something in your teeth.
YOU MENTIONED LIVING IN THE MOMENT, DO YOU HAVE WAYS OF TRAINING YOURSELF TO DO THAT?
I’m very fortunate to live on the beach and like to get up to watch the sun rise and have that 10 or 15 minutes to myself. That is my moment to feel gratitude and, in busier times, it was also my time to run through my day in my head.
I FIND SWIMMING IN THE SEA REALLY HELPS ME MENTALLY. DO YOU SWIM MUCH?
No, because it’s cold! I know it’s supposed to be so good for you. My husband does cold plunges and, once in a while, he talks me into doing it with him. But there are only so many things I can do for wellness and getting into cold water is not one of them!
AFTER MANY DECADES OF MODELLING, DO YOU STILL FEEL A SENSE OF DISCIPLINE ABOUT WHAT YOU EAT AND HOW YOU EXERCISE?
I don’t like the word ‘diet’, but I still choose to eat well. I was never one of the people who could eat what I wanted – even I used to get annoyed when Kate Moss would be eating a burger and fries and smoking a cigarette! When I moved to New York, I knew I was going to have to change the way I ate or I wouldn’t be able to get into the clothes – and, by the way, the clothes were much bigger then than the sample sizes now. But the way I’ve exercised has changed. In my 20s, I would work out hard and flop down on the couch. Then, I had little kids and realised my workouts couldn’t tire me any more, they actually had to energise me instead. Now my goal is not to get hurt. So, I have added a lot more stretching and Pilates, and I don’t feel as compelled to do those tough workouts any more.
I READ THAT, WHEN IT COMES TO FOOD, YOU STRIVE TO BE ‘80% GOOD, 80% OF THE TIME’.
Yeah, I think that’s achievable. The worst thing is feeling like you’re depriving yourself, so if you give yourself room within the way you eat and you know where you’re going to blow it, that’s okay. I never wanted to set an example to my kids that looking good meant you had to sacrifice, so when they were little, if we would go out as a family for ice cream, I would always order one, too. As a mother of a daughter, especially, I didn’t want her to wonder why I didn’t have one – it might
have been small or I might not have eaten it all, but I wanted to show her that food is one of life’s greatest pleasures.
IS THERE AN AGE THAT YOU’VE FELT YOUR MOST EMOTIONALLY AND PHYSICALLY ‘TOGETHER’?
It’s always a teeter-totter, right? When you’re young, you have the beauty and strength of youth, but you’re really hard on yourself and you haven’t done the work on the inside yet. As you get older, you’ve figured out who you are, but you’re thinking, ‘That’s not where it used to be any more!’ Maybe that’s the point – having insecurities and flaws is what makes us human.
YOU’VE SAID THAT, IN YOUR CAREER, OWNING YOUR POWER WAS ABOUT ‘VOTING YOURSELF IN’…
That quote was about doing nudes. I have done a lot of nudes and swimsuit shoots, but the ones you regret are the times you feel pressured in the moment. When I did Playboy with Herb Ritts, I felt totally comfortable. I could have killed the whole shoot if I wanted and that allowed me to do it in a way that felt safe. But there were times when I haven’t felt I had a voice. I did the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue early in my career and the woman overseeing it was very controlling. I remember getting to Thailand and she wanted me to wear a turban for the first shot. At the time, I thought, I am not sure the guys who read Sports Illustrated think that turbans are very sexy, and I voiced that, and she did not like it. I ended up only having one small picture in the magazine. I thought, ‘Wow, I’m being reprimanded for speaking my mind – I’m not really down with that.’
HOW DO YOU DEVELOP THE CONFIDENCE TO SPEAK UP IN THOSE SITUATIONS?
Generally, in a new environment, you’re not the loudest voice in the room. You have to suss out the situation and understand the dynamics before trying to speak your mind. But with success comes affirmation that your ideas and opinions matter at least as much as anyone else’s. Now, I’m definitely a straight shooter.
WHAT HAS BEEN YOUR PROUDEST CAREER SUCCESS?
Longevity. I’m not doing the same work as when I was a 25-year-old model, but I was able to turn that success into my own projects. I didn’t have a road map as I didn’t know what the potential was. I started modelling at around 17, then MTV happened – my model agency didn’t want me to do it because it paid no money and it was small and underground, but I said yes, because it gave me the opportunity to have a personality and not just be a two-dimensional picture in a magazine. After Sports Illustrated, I did my own swimsuit calendar and gave the money to a charity I support. It was the first time I realised I could have an idea, make it happen and have the potential to be successful.
HAVE THERE BEEN ANY FAILURES ALONG THE WAY THAT YOU’VE LEARNED FROM?
I did a movie called Fair Game. I never really wanted to be an actor, but a guy I met, who was a producer, begged me to be in it and kept upping the price until I thought, ‘I’m an idiot to say no.’ But I should have said no, or prepared myself better. The valuable takeaway was that I’m very comfortable in front of the camera, but only when I’m being me. But that was a gift, because as a model, a lot of people send you scripts and I was tempted – I was dating an actor at the time – but I let all that go and I realised that as much as I love watching actors, I don’t think I am one.
WHAT DOES SUCCESS LOOK LIKE TO YOU NOW?
Having balance. In order to have success in one thing, I don’t have to give up something else. I’ll take on projects, but they need to offer me more than financial reward. Is it going to be fun? Do I like the people I work with? Is it going to stretch my mind?
TALKING OF SUCCESS, YOU’VE BEEN MARRIED TO YOUR HUSBAND, RANDE, FOR 23 YEARS. WHAT DO YOU BELIEVE IS KEY TO SUSTAINING A RELATIONSHIP?
Friendship. With my husband, I feel even if we weren’t together, we’d be friends. Of course, you have to have sexual chemistry, but our relationship is based on friendship and mutual respect.
WHEN IT COMES TO PARENTING, WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU’VE DONE WELL AND WHAT ARE YOU WORKING ON?
Parenting is the hardest and most rewarding job. Rande and I made our kids feel included. If we had friends over for dinner, they sat with us and I think that’s served them well. They’ve always been comfortable being around older people and asking questions. What could I do better? Probably not offer help unless it’s asked for. You want to do everything for your kids, but when I stand back and they come to me for advice, they’re more likely to listen. When I offer it unsolicited, it just annoys them.