Gisele Bundchen was born on July 20, 1980 in Horizontina, Rio Grande de Sul, Brazil. Her birtname is Gisele Caroline Nonnenmacher B�ndchen.
With six daughters in the family, her five other sisters are all natural phenomenons. Raquel, Graziela, Gabriela, Patricia, and Rafaela are all aspiring models.

As a school girl, Gisele was taunted with the nickname Olive Oil, the waif thin girl friend of Popeye the Sailor in cartoons. Her career as a model started when she was only 15 years old, on a school trip to Sao Paulo in 1995. While grabbing a Big Mac in a shopping mall, she was seen by a modeling agent who approached her and asked if she had any interest in becoming a model. Despite her father's lack of approval of the career choice, he allowed her to move to Sao Paulo and she entered the Elite Look Modeling Competition, and her career took off.

Gisele has modeled for all the major fashion houses such as Ralph Lauren, Versace, Valentino and Chloe. She also has appeared on several magazine covers.

Gisele has recently signed a multimillion-dollar contract with North American lingerie firm, Victoria's Secret. As a result, the Brazilian beauty will appear in several of their lingerie, beauty and hosiery campaigns for television and print, as well as in their point-of-sale materials.

Gisele Bundchen lives in Los Angeles, an apartment in New York and a house out in the country in up-state New York. She has had her belly-button pierced and has a tattoo of a star drawn on the inside of her left wrist.

Misspellings & aliases:
Giselle, Gissele, Gisselle, Gisehle, Gisell, Gisel, B�ndchen, Buendchen, Bunndchen, Bundsjen, Bundschen, Bunchen, Bunschen, Bondchen, Bundchenn.