Christy Turlington Biography Quotes 32 Report mistakes

Early Life and Beginnings
Christy Nicole Turlington was born on January 2, 1969, in Walnut Creek, California, and grew up in the Bay Area. The daughter of an American father who worked in commercial aviation and a mother from El Salvador, she was exposed early to different cultures and languages, a grounding that would later inform both her studies and her humanitarian commitments. As a teenager, she discovered horses and riding, and it was around a stable, while still in her mid-teens, that she was first photographed and encouraged to try modeling. What began as a part-time pursuit quickly showed real potential. By her late teens, she was traveling for work, balancing school with test shoots and early bookings as she learned the rhythms of the fashion industry.

Rise to International Fame
Turlington's ascent in the late 1980s coincided with fashion's shift toward the idea of the "supermodel". Signed to major agencies and steadily building her portfolio, she became a runway and editorial regular in New York, Paris, and Milan. Campaigns and covers followed, and she soon emerged as one of the most recognizable faces of her generation. She became closely associated with Calvin Klein, particularly through the Eternity fragrance campaign, whose minimalist aesthetic and emotional tone suited her classical features and quiet presence. Alongside peers Naomi Campbell, Linda Evangelista, Cindy Crawford, Tatjana Patitz, Claudia Schiffer, and later Kate Moss, she helped define an era in which models moved beyond anonymity to become cultural figures. The era's most influential editors, stylists, and casting directors championed her, and she became a fixture on the runways and in advertising for houses including Calvin Klein, Versace, Chanel, and Prada.

Artistic Collaborations and Cultural Impact
A hallmark of Turlington's career was the depth of her collaboration with photographers. She worked extensively with Steven Meisel, Peter Lindbergh, and Herb Ritts, whose images of her, black-and-white portraits, kinetic runway shots, and quietly composed studio work, are now part of the visual canon of late 20th-century fashion. In 1990, she appeared with her peers in George Michael's "Freedom! '90" music video, directed by David Fincher, which crystallized the supermodel phenomenon for a global audience by allowing models to inhabit the role of pop icons. Her consistency and professionalism earned the trust of designers and editors; she became known on set for a calm efficiency and an ability to communicate feeling with minimal gesture. This understated approach, combined with rare editorial range, from ethereal couture stories to stripped-back beauty images, made her a touchstone for a generation of photographers and stylists.

Education and Personal Development
At the height of her career, Turlington made the unusual decision to pursue academic study in New York. She enrolled at New York University, focusing on comparative religion and philosophy, subjects that aligned with a growing interest in questions of meaning, ethics, and global culture. Years later, she formalized her interest in public health by completing a graduate degree in the field at Columbia University. This educational path, undertaken while continuing selective work in fashion, helped broaden her platform and clarified her voice as an advocate. A dedicated student of yoga since the 1990s, she explored the discipline as both physical practice and philosophical inquiry, eventually authoring "Living Yoga: Creating a Life Practice", a book that blended memoir, practice guidance, and reflections on balance and purpose.

Maternal Health Advocacy and Filmmaking
Motherhood in the early 2000s reshaped Turlington's priorities and led her toward public health advocacy. After experiencing a childbirth-related complication, she became aware of the global scale of maternal mortality and morbidity. This personal experience catalyzed a sustained commitment: she founded Every Mother Counts, a nonprofit organization focused on making pregnancy and childbirth safe for every mother, everywhere. Through partnerships, grants, and awareness campaigns, the organization supports community-based solutions, midwifery training, transportation to care, and respectful maternity services across the United States and in several countries.

To broaden public understanding, Turlington turned to filmmaking. Her directorial debut, the documentary "No Woman, No Cry", followed women and caregivers in the United States, Tanzania, Bangladesh, and Guatemala to illuminate systemic barriers to safe childbirth. The film premiered at a major festival and served as a cornerstone for subsequent outreach. She later executive-produced and appeared in additional projects, including television documentaries that examined maternal health within the American healthcare landscape. Working with clinicians, midwives, policymakers, and fellow advocates, she used narrative and data to make a case for evidence-based, dignified, and equitable maternity care. Her advocacy positioned her in dialogue with public health leaders and philanthropists while maintaining a deeply personal connection to the families and frontline providers her organization supports.

Running, Wellness, and Public Engagement
Turlington's long-standing interest in wellness extended beyond yoga into endurance running, which she embraced as both a personal discipline and a method of fundraising and awareness-building for Every Mother Counts. She has completed multiple major marathons, including New York, often leading charity teams to support maternal health programs. The visibility of these efforts, amplified by the support of friends, fellow runners, and colleagues from fashion and media, helped translate individual athletic milestones into tangible community impact. Public talks at universities, conferences, and cultural institutions allowed her to connect the dots between storytelling, philanthropy, and policy.

Personal Life
In 2003, Turlington married filmmaker and actor Edward Burns. The couple has two children, and their family life has remained intentionally private, even as both partners maintain public careers. Burns's work as a director and actor and Turlington's ongoing commitments have occasionally overlapped in shared creative and charitable circles, but the couple is known for keeping a grounded home life. The demands of travel and shooting schedules in fashion and film were balanced by her educational pursuits and later by her leadership role at Every Mother Counts, where she works closely with a network of colleagues, advisors, and healthcare partners.

Continuing Work and Influence
Christy Turlington's influence in fashion endures through periodic returns to the runway and new campaigns that highlight the longevity of her career and the evolving role of models as advocates and entrepreneurs. Her collaborations with designers and photographers, spanning decades, continue to be referenced by younger creatives. At the same time, her public health work keeps her engaged with complex policy and systems questions: how to strengthen midwifery, how to ensure transport and respectful care, and how to address disparities that disproportionately affect marginalized communities. She is frequently in conversation with clinicians, community organizers, and public officials who share these goals, and she is recognized for bridging the worlds of culture and health.

Legacy
Turlington's legacy is twofold. In fashion, she helped define a period when models were not only the faces of brands but collaborators in image-making; her work with Steven Meisel, Peter Lindbergh, Herb Ritts, and designers such as Calvin Klein and Gianni Versace set a standard for elegance and restraint that remains influential. In public life, she transformed personal experience into sustained, strategic advocacy for mothers and families. By founding Every Mother Counts and directing "No Woman, No Cry", she widened the conversation from celebrity philanthropy to measurable impact and respectful care. Alongside peers like Naomi Campbell, Linda Evangelista, Cindy Crawford, and Claudia Schiffer, figures who each expanded what a modeling career could encompass, Christy Turlington has demonstrated that cultural visibility can be leveraged responsibly, with empathy and rigor, in service of enduring social change.

Our collection contains 32 quotes who is written by Christy, under the main topics: Witty One-Liners - Ethics & Morality - Friendship - Learning - Live in the Moment.

Other people realated to Christy: Eva Herzigova (Model), Donatella Versace (Designer), Kevyn Aucoin (Artist), Claudia Schiffer (Model)