Spotlight: Style Icon

Sophia Loren

Does this picture NOT just scream Style?

She was born Sofia Villani Scicolone, September 20, 1934, in Rome, Italy. Her father refused to marry her mother and left, leaving Sophia, her mother and sister to struggle and have to move in with relatives. During World War II, Sophia was running to a shelter during a raid of a frequent bombing target close to where they lived and was hit with shrapnel and wounded in the chin. She entered a beauty contest when she was 15 and didn’t win! Later she began acting classes and was picked to star in Quo Vadis, in 1951, launching her acting career.

One of the judges from a beauty contest she entered, Carlo Ponti, went on to later become her husband. They had 2 sons, Loren stayed married to Ponti until his death in 2007. When asked in a November 2009 interview if she is ever likely to marry again, Loren replied "No, never again. It would be impossible to love anyone else."

I picked Sophia Loren as one of my Style Icons, not only because she has always been one of the most beautiful women I have ever seen!!!!... But as I researched her I became more intrigued how this woman who didn’t have the easiest life has ALWAYS appeared graceful, elegant and assured. She was abandoned by her father as a little girl. That in itself could have set her on a path of low self-esteem and insecurity; trying to meet those needs in other men. She lived in a war-ridden country and was hit in the face with shrapnel and still remains the epitome of beauty. She was a Runner Up in beauty Competitions. That means she didn’t win….that means she failed. But she kept going. She met her much older husband when she was 15 and when he passed she said that “It would be impossible to love anyone else.” I want to love someone like that!!!! I want to maintain grace and elegance and assuredness in the way that I carry myself. Style is living your life confidently, knowing exactly who you are.

Mz. Loren has got it.

Inspired, Middlest