When Cindy Crawford walked into a lounge in the Santa Monica Proper Hotel on a morning in early June, her vibe was immediate: comfortable, professional, direct. No artifice. No entourage.
Just her longtime publicist Annett Wolf, who made a brief introduction and disappeared, leaving Crawford at the head of a table set with a display of the products from her Meaningful Beauty line of skin and hair care, a US$400mil (approximately RM1.8bil) brand she introduced 20 years ago. “Where do you want to start?” Crawford asked.
“What feels the most organic?” It’s tempting to describe Crawford, 58, as casual, but that’s not quite it. Dressed in a Celine corduroy jean jacket, a camisole, Nili Lotan bootleg jeans and a Foundrae charm necklace symbolising resilience, her beauty is radiant without being the least bit overwhelming. A resident of Malibu, where she lives with her husband of 27 years, nightlife and tequila maestro Rande Gerber, she exuded California unfussiness.
She is a familiar face, literally, having been photographed and filmed thousands of times over the course of her 35-plus-year career as one of the world’s most successful models. What felt most organic was to start with the "business of Cindy". More than the mole above her lip, more than her brown eyes and va-va-voom brown hair and her healthy physique, Crawford’s interest in transcending modelling to become a brand – decades before personal branding was a career path – is what has distinguished her .