Claudia Schiffer was born in Rheinberg, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, and began modelling in 1987, after being spotted in a nightclub in Düsseldorf. Just weeks later she appeared in ELLE and within a short time she began modelling for Chanel. In the early 1990s she starred in Guess? jeans adverts in North America. She has appeared in a number of films and music videos. She was in Westlife's cover of Billy Joel's "Uptown Girl," as the iconic uptown girl and had a cameo in Bon Jovi's video "Thank You for Loving Me". In 1993, she appeared in the children's movie, Richie Rich.
Schiffer was engaged to the magician David Copperfield for about 6 years until 1999 when she met Tim Jefferies. Paris Match claimed their engagement was possibly contractual, but this assertion was later found to be dubious by a French Court.
On 25 May 2002, she married film producer Matthew Vaughn, son of George Albert Harley Drummond (also known as George de Vere Drummond). Schiffer and Vaughn have two children together; son Caspar Matthew, born 30 January 2003 and daughter Clementine de Vere Drummond, born 11 November 2004. They all now live in London.
