Born: 1974, San Juan, Puerto Rico

Height: 1.74 m
Measurements: (US) 34-23-34 ; (EU) 86-58-86

-

-

By Sara Templeton

Astrid Muñoz is proud to be one of the first Latin models to break into the big ticket European modeling scene, but more than reaching the pinnacle of the modeling world, she's happy to be doing what she does.

And at the end of the day, if you can find a job that you enjoy and that you can be happy about, most other things will fall into place.

Take my humble self for example: I have an cruisey job that I enjoy, surrounded by great people here at Web Wombat, and just the other day I came across a half-eaten burrito someone had dropped in the gutter. Some call it luck, but I think happiness begets positive encounters.

Anyway, when Astrid was a young girl, growing up in San Juan, which is in Puerto Rico and where she was born in 1974, it is said that she often dreamt of being a model.

Like many aspiring designers and models, she read the fashion magazines and took quite a liking to elaborate clothes the models wore. Not always practical, they were nevertheless an ever-evolving art form that was always flowing.

As the eldest of three children, she lived in a fairly strict family and is said to have had many chaperones to keep the evil boys away, and then at the age of 14, Astrid was offered the chance to began modeling in Spain.

But like all overprotective parents, her mother stepped in a put an end to that before things went any further.

Mother's can be stern, as most will attest to, but her father - a nuclear engineer - was also opposed to the idea. So father's can be stern with their children too. And so, without any fanfare, Astrid Muñoz resiled herself to a life of drudgery, attending school and missing out on a potentially amazing (if innocence destroying) adventure into the world of fashion.

But that wasn't the end of the story, as the photos on this web page illustrate. The 174cm tall brunette was in Miami at the age of 19 where she was catching up with a friend, when she was approached by an agent who recommended that she try her hand at modeling.

And before you can say "19 is way too old to begin a career as a model" she travelled to Paris and after plenty of hard work and long hours improving her portfolio, Astrid struck the big time, and success was hers.

After spending many years in Europe, appearing in magazines like Top Model (French and US editions) and Elle, and doing runway shows for some of the biggest names in the Northern Hemisphere, she moved to New York, as most top models do when their bank accounts begin to swell.

The hazel eyed Puerto Rican model with symmetrical facial features has had contracts with quite a few modeling agencies in her time as a top model, including Storm in London, Marilyn in Paris, Riccardo Gay in Milan and the Next modeling agency in New York. And the moral of Astrid's story? It's not about cloying parents, the loss of innocence or even chance encounters with enigmatic strangers who profess to be talent 'scouts'.

No, it's all in the genes ultimately. If you're born aesthetically challenged, you'll probably never be a model. But you could end up being be a new media desk monkey. Both are fun.

-

I remember Astrid. She said she wanted to be a nun until she realized nuns could not have babies. She also used to skip school alot and hung out at the beach.

*

-