Gigi Does Rio

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GIGI HADID is many things: supermodel, friend of Kendall Jenner and Hailey Baldwin Bieber, daughter of Yolanda Hadid and Mohamed Hadid, sister of Bella and Anwar, and currently, on top of the world. Nina Garcia chats with the 23-year-old fashion star on the occasion of her first U.S. ELLE cover.

NINA GARCIA: Gigi, you travel more than seems possible for one person. Where are you now?

GIGI HADID: I’m at the [family] farm. In the past few years, I’ve discovered how important it is for me to find my balance. There is a week where I do all of my traveling for that month. Sometimes I’m in a different country every day, but it gets it out of the way.

NG: I’ve heard about this farm from your mother, Yolanda. It sounds like it’s really the family’s haven.

GH: It’s where we can all come and feel like ourselves again. When I’m here, I just get in my truck and go to the store. Kids get excited at the market, but they don’t take their phones out. They want us to feel normal, and that’s very appreciated.

NG: So much has happened in the five years since you made your New York Fashion Week debut. I remember Jeremy Scott was one of your first shows, and you opened for him.

GH: I was so nervous I couldn’t breathe. I was like, “Really, you want me to open?” I’d never gone to a runway class. Over the years, I’ve learned how to guide myself through it—how to stuff my shoes. A lot of people judged that I was a bad runway walker because they were literally watching me learn.

NG: You’ve been modeling since you were a baby, though. At what point did you know it was going to be your career?