Inside supermodel Christie Brinkley's turbulent life in the spotlight

When Christie Brinkley walked into a Paris post office to make a phone call about her sick dog, she was asked a question that proved life-altering.

It was the early 1970s and the future American supermodel – whose new memoir Uptown Girl is set to be released in April – was living in the City of Love. She had walked the short distance from her apartment to phone for a veterinarian. Her puppy, Tempête, was unwell. As she waited, a photographer asked if he could take her photo.

The then 19-year-old Brinkley was initially wary of the man, American photographer Errol Sawyer, and his offer. She pocketed the piece of paper he'd written down his name and address on and bid him farewell.

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Christie Brinkley with Patrick Demarchelier, one of the first photographers she ever met on a model shoot. (Christie Brinkley/Instagram)

"A few weeks later, I was with a friend who recognised the photographer's name, so she accompanied me to the address. Things moved really quickly from there," Brinkley told US lifestyle publication Westlake Malibu in 2021.

"The photographer introduced me to the modelling agency, and while I was there, I was introduced to Patrick Demarchelier and Mike Reinhardt. They promptly called Eileen Ford and insisted that she see me immediately."

Before the chance encounter with the photographer, the Michigan born and Los Angles raised Brinkley spent an extended stay in Paris, paying her way as an illustrator.

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Her love for Paris, also known as the City of Lights, began in childhood. She loved French berets, the Eiffel Tower and dreamed of being an artist living in Paris. She even learned French at school.

Brinkley also found love in Paris. She married French artist Jean-François Allaux in 1973. They lived in a little garret under the rooftops where the toilet was two flights downstairs and the shower was two blocks away.

After her test modelling test shoot, she used the money she earned to travel. When her agents from Ford Models called to book her, she was out of communication.

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"The agency told everyone that I was booked, and that created an even greater demand. So when I returned home from my travels, I found dozens of pinned messages on my front door. The entire door was covered," she said in a 2021 interview.

The messages were from the agency telling her she had jobs waiting for her and to phone them. Brinkley was stunned.

After her modelling career started to take off, she and Allaux left Paris for Manhattan. The trip was meant to last just one year. But they never left.

By 1979, when Brinkley was 25, she graced the cover of Sports Illustrated. She returned as the magazine's cover girl for the next two years.

She is best known as the face of CoverGirl, a job she held for 25 years.

Despite her career on a rapid rise, she and Allaux's relationship faulted. After eight years of marriage they divorced in 1981.

Brinkley famously made a cameo in the iconic 1983 film National Lampoon's Vacation. (National Lampoons)

As one of the most recognised women in America, fascination by the gossip magazines in Brinkey's personal life intensified.

In 1982 she met Olivier Chandon de Brailles, a French race car driver and heir to the Moët-Chandon Champagne fortune.

The pair met at a party Brinkley hosted at the infamous Studio 54 nightclub for her new calendar.

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Brinkley with French racing driver Olivier Chandon de Brailles; their year-long romance was cut tragically short. (Getty)

Tragically, their romance was cut short in 1983 when Chandon died during a test drive.

Brinkley found love again when a friendship blossomed with American singer Billy Joel. 

The pair met in 1983 while separately holidaying on the Caribbean island of St Bart's. Joel contacted Brinkley following Chandon's sudden death and a friendship formed. Soon after, they began dating.

The supermodel and Billy Joel circa 1983; they married two years later. (Getty)

However, awkwardly, Joel was reportedly dating Elle Macpherson at the same time.

In a 2018 interview, the Australian model she said she was living with Joel in his Central Park West penthouse in New York City.

"I think he was dating Christie at the time, just starting to," she said. "So yeah, I got ousted, what can I say?"

Joel's hit song Uptown Girl is believed to have been written about Macpherson, yet Brinkley starred in the music video.

The music clip was the start of their relationship and Brinkley's foray into acting.

Brinkley and Joel married in 1985 on a luxury 147-foot boat on New York's Hudson River. They chose this location to avoid the paparazzi.

Brinkley with her fourth husband Peter Halsey Cook. (Getty)

Brinkley walked down the aisle wearing a Norma Kamali satin dress and carrying 50 long-stemmed ivory roses.

The couple welcomed their first and only child together, daughter Alexa, in 1985.

Brinkley and Joel remained together until 1994 when they separated and then divorced. Reasons for the couple's breakup were never made public, and they remain good friends.

Brinkley married for a third time in late 1994 after being introduced to property developer Richard Taubman. The couple share a son, Jack.

Their relationship wasn't to last, with Brinkley and Taubman divorcing in 1995.

A year later, in 1996, Brinkley walked down the aisle a fourth time.

She's now announced her new memoir, Uptown Girl, is coming out in April. (Instagram)

She tied the knot with architect Peter Halsey Cook. The pair had reconnected after first meeting in the late 1970s during Brinkley's early modelling days.

They share a daughter, Sailor, together. Cook also adopted Brinkley's son Jack.

Brinkley and Cook sensationally divorced in 2008 after 10 years of marriage. During their divorce proceedings Cook revealed he had an affair with his 18-year-old assistant and spent US$3000 a month on Internet pornography.

John Mellencamp and Christie Brinkley were in a relationship for one year from 2019 until 2020.

The revelations shattered Brinkley's "perfect life". She asked for full custody of the couple's two children.

"I didn't want this trial. It's humiliating for all of us," Brinkley said on the witness stand in New York family court in Central Islip, Long Island.

The settlement arrangement awarded Brinkley custody of the couple's children, while Cook was given "parenting time" and a financial settlement of US$2.1 million (approx. 3.4 million).

Brinkley kept all of the couple's properties, including 18 properties in the Hamptons.

The model remained quiet about her personal life until opening up in 2020 about her relationship with American singer John Mellencamp.

"I thought, 'Oh my gosh, we're really opposites. He's kind of a throwback from another time, like a silent cowboy,' " she told People. "But then we talked and realised that we do have a lot of shared interests."

In 2024, Brinkley shared a series of candid photos following surgery for a skin cancer to her face. (Instagram)

Despite seemingly finding love again, this time at age 62, Brinkley and Mellencamp's romance ended after a year.

"Both the mileage between their homes and their heavy career demands interfered with their ability to maintain the relationship," a rep for the pair told People.

"They vowed to remain best of friends."

In 2024, then-70-year-old Brinkley revealed she was taking time to heal after a recent skin cancer diagnosis.

She shared photos of herself after having surgery to remove a basal cell carcinoma.

"The good news for me is we caught the basal cell Carcinoma early," her post began.

"And I had great doctors that removed the cancer and stitched me up to perfection like an haute couture Dior. The good news for you is that all of this can be avoided by being diligent with your sun protection."

Brinkley shared that doctors discovered the skin cancer rather fleetingly while at a doctor's appointment for one of her daughters.

"The doctor was looking at each freckle with a magnifying glass… it wasn't my appointment so I wasn't going to say anything," she said.

"But at the VERY end I asked if he could just look at a little tiny dot I could feel as I applied my foundation. He took a look and knew immediately it needed a biopsy."

It wasn't the first health scare for the model and businesswoman. In 2021, she revealed she had a hip replacement stemming from a helicopter crash back in 1994.

"I injured my hip in a back country skiing helicopter crash on a mountaintop in Telluride many years ago. The pain in my hip got a little bit worse each year," she said.

"Twelve years ago I was told it needed to be replaced but the surgery was daunting."

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