Before her name became a byword for “good taste,” Martha Stewart was born Martha Kostyra, the oldest daughter of six children in a well-to-do Polish Catholic family. Raised in Nutley, New Jersey, she displayed an entrepreneurial knack from an early age: A 10-year old Martha booked her first paid gig by planning birthday parties for the kids in her neighborhood. She began modeling as a teenager, earning $50 an hour to appear in ad campaigns for the likes of Chanel and Tareyton cigarettes. With her 5’9” frame and knockout beauty, Stewart’s modeling portfolio radiates the same mix of cold charm and playful sensuality that would later define her entire brand.
But it would take some time before Stewart became known, as David Letterman once referred to her, as the “James Brown of home entertaining.” Stewart modeled into her early twenties, mostly as a way to supplement her scholarship money at Barnard College. After graduating with a degree in architectural history, she married Yale Law student Andy Stewart, had a daughter, Alexis, in 1965, and worked on Wall Street as the only female stockbroker at her firm. “The job taught me so much about what it takes to build a real business, a real company—a meaningful and useful enterprise,” Stewart later recalled. “Yet it was not until I left Wall Street that I discovered my true entrepreneurial bent. I loved ideas. I loved building. I loved creating….and I loved making money as a result.”
Raised by parents who passed on their love of cooking and gardening, Stewart left Wall Street in the mid-’70s to start a catering company out of the basement of Turkey Hill, her iconic former residence in Westport, Connecticut. Stewart’s kitchen skills and sophisticated aesthetic earned her a reputation amongst any East Coaster lucky enough to attend one of her garden parties. Many of the recipes she developed as a caterer would eventually be featured in her first cookbook, Entertaining, which became an instant bestseller when it hit holiday shelves in 1982.
Almost 40 years, 97 books, an illuminating documentary, and an entire media empire later, Stewart remains as gloriously un-relatable as ever. When she isn’t posting thirst traps from the pool of her Hamptons estate, Stewart is still dreaming up new ways to expand the reach of her brand even further (from CBD skincare to her very first physical stories coming soon to the U.S.). To celebrate the entrepreneur, author, tastemaker, lifestyle super-influencer, and DIY icon’s 84th birthday, Vogue digs into the archives to compile a photographic tribute to Stewart’s pre-fame days as a rising model and aspiring businesswoman.
Photo: Frank Horvat1/26Stewart was a student at Barnard College in New York City when Glamour selected her to appear in a “10 best-dressed college girls” spread for their August 1961 issue.
Photo: Courtesy of Martha Stewart2/26In the 1960s, Martha moved to New York City to study history and architectural history at Barnard College. She modeled to support herself.
Photo: Courtesy of Martha Stewart3/26Discovered at the age of 15, Stewart signed with the legendary agency Ford Models and immediately started booking television commercials. “I got enough modeling jobs at $50 an hour—which was a lot of money at that time,” she explained in the documentary Makers.
Photo: Courtesy of Martha Stewart4/26Photographed in her 9-5 era, when she was working on Wall Street.
Photo: Milton Greene5/26Stewart posing with an American flag in the August 1961 issue of Glamour.
Photo: Courtesy of Martha Stewart6/26In addition to various television commercials. Stewart's modeling clients included the likes of Tareyton Cigarettes, Breck, Lifebuoy Soap, and Clairol.
Photo: Courtesy of Martha Stewart7/26Stewart closely studied Italian, German, and French cuisine while on a modeling assignment in Europe in the early '60s.
Photo: Courtesy of Martha Stewart8/26Stewart supplemented her scholarship money at Barnard College with her modeling income. Originally a chemistry major, she eventually graduated with a double major in history and architectural history.
Photo: Courtesy of Martha Stewart9/26Stewart has long enjoyed the company of animals, owning at least 20 cats, 25 dogs, 10 chinchillas, and scores more over the past 40 years or so. “Ever since I've owned a house, I've craved backyard farmyard animals,” she once wrote.
Photo: Courtesy of Martha Stewart10/26Stewart's modeling career ran the gamut, going so far as to walk in multiple fashion shows and appear in magazines, catalogues, and advertisements.
Photo: Courtesy of Martha Stewart11/26“During my modeling days, we didn't have a team of stylists for photoshoots. I had to do my hair myself,” Stewart wrote in a how-to guide inspired by her glamorous '60s updos.
Photo: Courtesy of Martha Stewart12/26“I knew that I could model, I knew I could pose for pictures, but I was not sexy, and I was not provocative,” Stewart told People. “That feeling never came. It still hasn't come. I’m waiting for that day.”
Photo: Courtesy of Martha Stewart13/26As an institutional stockbroker, Stewart entertained her clients at a number of New York City's top restaurants and would often ask chefs to share their tricks of the trade.
- Photo: Getty Images14/26
Martha and Andy Stewart holding a black Cochin hen and a basket of eggs outside the barnyard of their home.
Photo: Susan Wood15/26Stewart carrying a basket of eggs from a chicken coop on the grounds of her Westport, Connecticut farmhouse, 1976.
Photo: Susan Wood16/26Stewart kneading dough in her kitchen, 1976.
Susan Wood17/26Stewart working in the vegetable garden of her Connecticut farmhouse, as featured in the June 1977 issue of House & Garden.
Photo: Courtesy of Martha Stewart18/26Martha, photographed in the first home she shared with then-husband Andy Stewart in Turkey Hill, around 1972. She set herself a mission to build a chicken coop and populate it with various kinds of laying hens. She propeled a nationwide trend for homegrown poultry and eggs.
Photo: Susan Wood19/26Stewart carrying a basket of greens as she walks through her vegetable garden, 1976. “I was the only one of my father’s children who took naturally to the garden—I never minded the hours in the blazing sun, weeding and cultivating," she wrote in the introduction to Martha Stewart's Pies & Tarts. “My father sent for every garden catalogue available, and we pored over them together, choosing what we would like to have on an imaginary estate.”
- Photo: Getty Images20/26
Martha Stewart and husband Andy baking in their kitchen in 1980, as Martha catered an event.
Photo: Susan Wood21/26Located on Turkey Hill Road, Stewart and her ex-husband bought the dilapidated 1805 farmhouse in the early '70s and restored it to its former glory.
Photo: Susan Wood22/26Stewart outside her henhouse, which she lovingly referred to as the “Palais du poulet," 1976.
Photo: Susan Wood23/26Stewart’s kitchen in Turkey Hill would later become the model for the TV studio of Martha Stewart Living, which aired over a thousand episodes between 1993 and 2004.
Photo: Susan Wood24/26Stewart holding a basket of eggs while leaning against a wheelbarrow in the chicest way imaginable, 1976.
Photo: Arthur Schatz25/26Stewart during her catering days with her pet Persian cat, 1980.
Photo: Courtesy of Martha Stewart26/26Circa 1980, Martha hosts one of her small cooking seminars in her professional kitchen in Westport, Connecticut. “My audience has certainly grown, thanks to television, publishing, and the internet, but years later it still brings me so much joy,” she said of this time.
