Giada De Laurentiis

Giada De Laurentiis

Giada De Laurentiis
Granddaughter of illustrious film producer, Dino De Laurentiis, Giada De Laurentiis has never been a stranger to staring a camera crew in the eye. With old-school values, grandfather was strong in his beliefs that women should get married, have children, stay home and not work. In fact, since her family discouraged her from attending culinary school, Giada took a detour by getting her degree in anthropology from UCLA before taking the bull by the horns and taking off for Le Cordon Bleu in Paris. When she returned to the U.S., Giada started down the road to stardom paying her dues as a restaurant chef, then as private chef to Ron Howard, and then as a food stylist and caterer. Eventually in 2002 she was discovered by the Food Network and quickly grew to celebrity chef status. They have since featured her cooking series, Everyday Italian, as well as a number of specials. She has also written three hugely popular, best-selling cookbooks.

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Talk about "best worlds", if you've noticed that this photogenic Italian charmer is also very snappily dressed, think no further. Her long time boyfriend and now husband, Todd Thompson, is a clothing designer for Anthropologie!

Their home is one that Todd owned prior to their meeting. At that time it was a Mediterranean-style villa in Pacific Palisades on a bluff overlooking the Santa Monica Mountains and Pacific Ocean. The house was both charming and romantic, but both Todd and Giada envisioned a sleek contemporary with more efficient use of the existing space. Neighbor and architect, Peter Cohen, was the perfect person to do the new design. Not only were Peter and Todd surfing buddies, but they both shared a love for the contemporary. Once engaged, the Mediterranean was torn down and in its place rose a two-story, clean-lined home of African teak, stucco and glass that made the most of functional living space and captured breathtaking views of the coastline and spectacular sunsets.

The moral of this true life story? Though starting out a little more blessed than most, Giada followed her dream against her family's wishes, and is now reaping the rewards of circumventing family expectations.

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