Kate Moss life at 50 as she swaps wild nights out for gardening and meditation
When asked last year how she felt about a very big birthday on the horizon, Kate Moss seemed to be in denial. “I’m not turning 50,” she said. “No. I’m not thinking about it. I do not feel 50.”
But, like it or not, the “anti-supermodel” and British national treasure reaches the milestone on 16 January. And after she wore a flowing black gown at the British Fashion Awards last month, it’s fair to say that the Croydon-born fashion goddess has still “got it”.
“Kate has a daring, chameleon-esque charm that transcends trends and, it appears, decades,” said American Vogue editor Anna Wintour. “She is a fashion original, who trusts her tastes and acts on her whims, a style innovator with rock-star swagger and uptown polish, as comfortable in vintage as in couture.”
Famously spotted by agency boss Sarah Doukas at JFK Airport in New York when she was only 14, Kate had a breakthrough cover shoot for style bible The Face.
Kate Moss turns 50-years-old on Tuesday (Samir Hussein/WireImage)
The fashion icon, pictured here in 1992, has been modelling for decades (Vic Singh/REX/Shutterstock)“It’s easy to forget how important it was after the 80s that Kate didn’t match up to prevailing model standards,” says a former editor of The Face, brand expert Richard Benson. “It wasn’t just the height; she had freckles, imperfect teeth and was photographed laughing naturally. She had the same interests as everyone else and wasn’t selling some sort of perfect model lifestyle, either.”
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In time, Kate became associated with “heroin chic”, becoming the poster girl for size-zero style. More waif-like than Amazonian “supers” such as Cindy Crawford and Elle Macpherson, her physique would cause controversy over the years. “Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels,” she quipped in a comment she later regretted.
Kate with late fashion designer, Dame Vivienne Westwood (Richard Young/REX/Shutterstock)
Kate has been wowing the fashion world since the 1980s (Penske Media via Getty Images)Reflecting in The Times newspaper on her naturally slim look, she explained, “I think I was a scapegoat for a lot of people’s problems. I was never anorexic – I never have been. I had never taken heroin. I was thin because I didn’t get fed at shoots or shows and I had always been thin.”
But that wasn’t the only bump in the road for Kate’s career, with a newspaper publishing photographs of her appearing to use cocaine in 2005. Police charges were dismissed due to lack of evidence, but her deals with labels such as Chanel and Burberry were cancelled in light of the adverse publicity.
Kate apologised, though never admitted she’d used drugs, and the public’s love affair with Britain’s top model continued. Back on the books of superbrands and fashion designers, she was becoming a cultural muse, posing for painter Lucian Freud and as the subject of Marc Quinn’s gold statue in the British Museum, made for a reported £1.5 million.
Kate poses between fellow supermodel Naomi Campbell and fashion designer Donatella Versace (Richard Young/REX/Shutterstock)On her long career, she noted, “It sounds really corny but I think that if you’re beautiful inside it shows on the outside. You can be a pretty face, but if you’re not a nice person, it just doesn’t work. I’m not traditionally a beauty, but apparently people think I’m alright.”
And Kate’s famous friends are legion. From make-up supremo Charlotte Tilbury to music legend Elton John, Kate has a loyal entourage. As she reaches middle age, there is no sign that she is losing her famous looks, and when quizzed about the possibilities of a little “help”, such as fillers or Botox, she snipped, “No comment. Au naturel. Next [question].”
As the recipient of numerous “world’s sexiest woman” awards, Kate’s love life has always been a subject of fascination. She had a four-year partnership with magazine publisher Jefferson Hack and the pair share daughter Lila Grace, now 21, who has been following in her mother’s modelling footsteps.
A raucous relationship with Libertines frontman Pete Doherty, 44, followed, before Kate married The Kills guitarist Jamie Hince, 55. Their marriage lasted five years, with rumours swirling about Kate’s relationship with photographer and aristocrat Count Nikolai von Bismarck, 37, who she’s still linked with today.
It may have been her first famous love, Johnny Depp, now 60, who influenced Kate’s lasting decision not to court publicity. She told Vanity Fair magazine, “He told me, ‘Never complain, never explain.’ That’s why I don’t use Twitter and things like that. That keeps the mystery.” And Kate was there for her ex in his hour of need, sensationally appearing to counter allegations about Depp’s abusive treatment of her made by his ex-wife Amber Heard at their high-profile defamation trial. “I know the truth about Johnny. I know he never kicked me down the stairs. I had to say that truth,” she later said, during a rare interview, on BBC Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs.
Nowadays, Kate is more likely to fill her time with meditation and crystals, ashtanga yoga and Pilates, and has founded her own wellness brand, Cosmoss. No doubt she will be celebrating with friends this week, but her wild days have been largely shelved to devote more time to the simple life. She grows vegetables at her home in Little Faringdon, Oxfordshire, rather than carousing around Notting Hill. It seems the extrovert we think we know is anything but. Beauty expert and broadcaster Sali Hughes agrees, saying, “She is very warm, down-to-earth and unpretentious but quite humble and not as self-assured as you might expect.
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“I imagine that as she moves into her fifties she’ll use her life experience, business chops and newfound Zen to quietly build the Cosmoss brand. While no doubt remaining Britain’s most stylish woman – of any age.”
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