|
Things are looking much better in
the new millennium for Daniela Pestova than they were in 1999. Daniela
landed the coveted Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue cover shot for the
2nd time, her first being in 1995. Born October 14, 1970 in the tiny Czech
Republic town of Teplice, Daniela has charmed many with her stunning
European beauty. Her problems in 1999 were well chronicled, which included
her separation from Tommaso Buti, to whom which they also share a young
boy who Daniela gave birth to in 1996. The two also were dealing with
heavy losses at the business which Buti started, the Fashion Cafe, which
included a criminal probe by New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer
alleging that Buti and Pestova bilked the restaurant chain out of
millions. Couple this with the fact that Claudia Schiffer and Naomi
Campbell ditched their association with Buti and the restaurant chain last
year and one begins to realize why Pestova wanted to disassociate herself
from the man. Ironically, most have said all this money siphoning was in
large part done to try to keep Daniela happy, a strategy that surely had
backfired on Buti, as she ditched him for a much more frugal situation
with an Australian photographer.
Daniela's modeling career was also turned upside down when she and several
other models bolted from Elite in 1999 to join the Donald Trump formed
Trump Management. Critics have scoffed that Trump created the organization
as more of a trophy than a business, as many have said he paid Pestova,
Elsa Benitez and others double what they were worth to get them to leave
the highly regarded Elite organization. Thankfully for the sake of their
son perhaps, the couple remain friends, as Buti told the New York Post "We
grew apart, but we talk every day. We have a great relationship."
The 5'11" blond haired, blue-eyed beauty like many others in her industry
never set out to be a model. Her upbringing in the Communist controlled
Czechoslovakia didn't make this career choice very likely, but fortunately
she was discovered by Madison modeling agency's Dominique Caffin, who
spotted her going into a theater, and the rest quickly became history. He
asked her to enter in a modeling contest which she won and from their, the
non-English speaking lovely headed to the land of the free in New York.
Quickly she was landing scores of magazine covers and landed a role
showcasing her incredible body with Victoria's Secret. She does admit that
unlike many other models that can eat anything and not gain weight, she
does have to control her diet, which includes avoiding breads, a staple
amongst her homeland Czech folks.
The second SI Swimsuit Issue has garnered Daniela a lot of positive
attention, where so far she's appeared on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno
and The Late Late Show With Craig Kilborn. The cover of SI features
Daniela wearing a tiny metallic bikini bottom and strands of beads over
her breasts and this year's issue for the first time includes 3-D glasses
to get a more realistic view of the beauties. This is not the most
revealing cover that Daniela has done though, as she appeared topless in a
cover of GQ magazine in '98, though only subscribers got this memorable
photo, as newsstands carried a different non nude version where Daniela
was wearing a bikini. Daniela has yet to break into film though it is
reported that she turned down role as a hard-partying model in a Woody
Allen film because she wasn't comfortable with the image it projected,
which is an image entirely unlike Daniela herself, who enjoys walking on
the beach, spending time with her child, and privacy. |
