Candice Swanepoel, Model

You can find anything in a flea market, we’ve heard. But don’t take our word for it – ask Candice Swanepoel. Since being spotted by a model scout in a Durban market, this beautiful South African has gone from a fifteen-year-old taunted by schoolmates to high-earning supermodel. By the time she turned sixteen, she was earning R40,000 for a day’s work.

Born at Mooi River, Natal Province, Candice speaks English and Afrikaans. She was still at the all-girl boarding school of St Anne’s College when she was discovered at the age of fifteen. Now twenty five, her many shoots have included covers for Vogue (Greece), Elle (Germany), Ocean Drive (US), and the UK’s GQ. She has been involved in ad campaigns with Diesel, Nike, Guess? and Versus eyewear.

Nicknamed Flamingo on account of her long legs, Candice has worked for Dolce and Gabbana, Tommy Hilfiger, Sass and Bide, Diane von Fürstenberg, and Betsey Johnson, to name but a few. She walked the runway for Victoria’s Secret in 2007, 2008 and 2009, and was the first Victoria’s Secret Angel from South Africa. She featured in the 2010 Swim catalogue, together with Erin Heatherton, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley and Lindsay Ellingson, and modelled for Kardashian’s 2010 swimwear line.

With her light brown hair and blue eyes, we’re not surprised that she was tenth in Askmen’s Top 99 Most Desirable Women for 2012. And yet at school, she was teased because she was so thin. She noticed young women of a similar build on television, and said to her mother: “The girls at school are teasing me, but I look like those girls on TV”. She needn’t have worried – in 2012, she appeared on Forbes’ World’s Top Earning Supermodels list, with an income of $3.1million. But she insists: “I don’t go crazy, or buy silly things”.

We realise that balance is very important on the catwalk, and Candice is aware of this, too. She works out three times a week, enjoying kick boxing, jumping ropes, and building muscles. If she’s tired, she practises yoga, which keeps her supple, and in a calm frame of mind.

Her survival tip is to: “Grow a thick skin. It’s a really great business if you don’t let certain things get to you”. And her wish is to join another kind of list, of inspirational people who have made a difference to the world. We think she’s in a good position to accomplish that!