Adriana Lima (Salvador de Bahía, Brazil, 1981) is known for being one of the most recognized Victoria's Secret Angels in the history of the lingerie firm. Her blue and slanted eyes, her perfectly tanned skin and her statuesque figure were some of the attributes that the specialized media highlighted time and time again.
At 41, the Brazilian is in a very quiet moment in her working life. She hung up the Victoria's Secret wings four years ago and lives away from her runways in her villa in India Creek, in Miami-Dade, Florida, with her husband and her three daughters, Valentina, Sienna and Cyan.
She became one of the most recognized –and highest paid- models in the world, but her rise was not what many know as a bed of roses. She was born in Salvador de Bahía, Brazil, in the bosom of a humble and unstructured family. Shortly after she was born, at six months, her parents, Nelson Torres, abandoned the family and it was her mother who had to get ahead, with hardly any financial resources.
Although she dazzled with her beauty, it was the organizers of a contest that convinced her to enter their 'Fords Model, Supermodel Brazil' contest. “Being a model never crossed my mind, in fact I didn't even know what fashion was. A friend told me to accompany her to a modeling contest and in the end they called me, ”she explained to the American edition of Vogue. She later came second in the same international contest, in 1996.
This marked a before and after in Lima's professional and personal life. At the age of 18, she signed with the famous Elite Model Management agency and moved to New York. She began to star in the covers of the most relevant fashion headlines, shared a set with the best photographers in the world, and fashion firms quickly began to take an interest in her.
At only 18 years old, she paraded for the first time for the firm that would definitely change her career: Victoria's Secret. Her appearance fit perfectly with the strict and controversial canons that angels boasted of. Shortly after, in 2015, she established herself as the highest-paid model in the world, just after Gisele Bündchen's withdrawal from the catwalks. Two years later, the New York lingerie firm referred to Lima as "her most valuable angel."
She married basketball player Marko Jaric in 2009 and moved to Spain, the country where the elite athlete worked. She was the mother of two girls, Valentina and Sienna, and Jaric finally ended up divorcing in 2016. About the physical change she experienced after the birth of her second daughter, the model explained to Vogue Spain: "after Sienna's birth I trained morning and afternoon, a total of 6 hours a day. It was hard but, helped by the diet, I managed to recover my figure in a very short time”.
During his best professional years, he starred in campaigns for Loewe, Blumarine, Miu Miu. She walked for Prada and also continued to do so for Victoria's Secret, as well as being one of those chosen to appear in the Pirelli calendar in 2013.
In 2018 he decided to put an end to and hang up the iconic "wings" and retire from the catwalks. In 2022 she became pregnant again and, since then, in each of her public appearances, her image has been analyzed and judged. At 40, her body is no longer the same as it was in her modeling days and, after giving birth to her last child, she has not recovered her figure as quickly as she once did. .
These factors added to the rumors about aesthetic touch-ups and botox and hyaluronic acid infiltrations in the face have earned him thousands of criticisms and hurtful comments on social networks. The model has never wanted to speak out about it and so she has been, silent and faithful to her principles.
