On the cusp of turning 50, Cindy Crawford says she is ready to retire from modeling.
“Or maybe not say goodbye but move on,” Crawford, whose birthday is Feb. 20, told United Airlines’ Rhapsody magazine in its new issue. “I’m sure I’ll have my picture taken for 10 more years, but not as a model anymore. And that’s OK. I’ve done it. I’ve worked with all these incredible photographers. What else do I need to do? I can’t keep reinventing myself. I shouldn’t have to keep proving myself. I don’t want to.”
One of fashion’s signature faces of the 1980s and 1990s, Crawford rode the rise of cable and home video to become a media brand in a way that such predecessors as Twiggy in the 1960s and Cheryl Tiegs in the 1970s did not. “There was no road map for the way my career is,” Crawford told the magazine. “There might be some luck — but also willingness to take chances and do things differently.”
She added that the media technology of today provides young models with even more avenues, saying teens “are all taking pictures of themselves, or having their friends take pictures for their social media.” Her 14-year-old daughter, fledgling-model Kaia — one of two children, along with 16-year-old son Presley, with husband Rande Gerber — “would be modeling even if she weren’t modeling. All the girls are modeling. They are not dependent only on how a photographer sees them. They have a direct relationship with their fans.”
Crawford said that at almost 50, “You realize, I’m still me. The fact that I am doing work that I love, have a good relationship with my husband, beautiful kids, all of that makes it not totally painless — because there’s still some yearning for what was — but what would I trade for it? What day or what experience of my life would I give up to be younger? Nothing.”
