Izabel Goulart

Biography
Izabel Goulart was born on October 23, 1984, in São Carlos, Brazil. She has four brothers and one sister. Goulart once said that "the hardest part about being an Angel is I spend time away from my mom's food and away from my home with my five brothers and sister."Blessed with a flawless physique and a fetching smile, it didn’t take long before she was discovered. “I was with my mother buying groceries in the center of my city when a hairdresser suggested that I should become a model,” she recalls. “So I moved to São Paulo and started modeling.”

Goulart has stated that school was a particularly rough time, as she was made fun of for her skinny build, and was even called names such as "giraffe". While shopping for groceries with her mother at age 14, a hairstylist suggested that she should become a model. She moved to the state's capital São Paulo and started modeling.

izabel goulart models for ralph lauren
Although she’s one of Brazil’s top exports, Izabel’s professional career got off to an inauspicious start when she experienced a wardrobe malfunction during her first runway show.

“For some reason everyone was wearing clothes and they put a bikini on me,” she says. “They tied up the bikini and put the top part behind my back and I was like ‘Guys that’s not going to work out. I’m not feeling comfortable with that. It’s going to fall.’ They’re like, ‘No you’re fine with this. Go girl, go!’ And then I started walking down. I was really nervous, it was my first time and I felt my bikini top falling down. I felt as I was walking something was coming down slowly and I was like, ‘Oh my God, oh my God, help me,' and when I completely got in front of the photographers it fell. I was just frozen and I saw everyone around me standing up clapping and laughing.”

The unfortunate incident made many Brazilian newspapers and remains Izabel’s most embarrassing moment. Luckily, she was able to put her rocky start behind her and returned to the runway to model collections for A-list designers such as Bill Blass, Jill Sander, Michael Kors, Ralph Lauren and Stella McCartney, among many others.

izabel goulart signs with victoria's secret
By 2005, Izabel’s success on the catwalk prompted a move to the Big Apple, where she was instantly signed to a multiyear contract by Victoria’s Secret and put on the catwalk with Gisèle Bündchen, Marisa Miller, Adriana Lima, Petra Nemcova, and Alessandra Ambrosio.

The Brazilian bombshell made her debut for the company later that year by modeling a bikini made out of candy at the 2005 Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show. “It was so delicious,” she says. “I was like talking to myself. I was like, ‘OK Izabel, if you be a good girl, don’t let anything fall out, and if you don’t fall you deserve to eat your outfit later on. And that’s what I did. It was so sweet. It was so delicious.”

izabel goulart on entourage
Izabel has since appeared in prominent ads for Cori, Diesel, Forum, G Series, Osklen, Pollini, Triton, Valfrance, Yohji Yamamoto, Zoomp, and more. She also made her acting debut in 2007 with a supporting role in the hit HBO series Entourage.