Tamara Czartoryska Biography

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Princess Tamara Laura Czartoryska (Spanish: Tamara Laura Maria de los Dolores Luisa Fernanda Victoria y Todos los Santos Czartoryski y Picciotto; born 23 April 1978) is a Polish-Spanish former model, television star, and noblewoman. She is the daughter of Prince Adam Czartoryski Borbn, who was born in Spain where he grew up with his first cousin, King Juan Carlos I of Spain.

Television

Her sporting achievements and aristocratic background led to roles as a presenter on a Thai kick boxing show, and appearances on Granada and Celebrity Five Go Dating.

In March 2005, Tamara was one of the contestants on series three of The Games, and won the bronze medal.

In 2006, she appeared on the reality television programmes Australian Princess and American Princess during which she offered advice to the competitors.

In 2007, she was a contestant on Sky One's reality show Cirque de Celebrit.

Family and upbringing

Her mother, Nora Picciotto, was born in Cairo, worked as a public relations consultant in the film industry, and married her father in London. Her father broke with his family's aristocratic tradition of leaving childcare entirely to nannies and seeing the children only at first rising and bedtime. But her parents separated and divorced before she was seven years old. Exposed to her father's playboy lifestyle, she nonetheless remained in awe of him and felt possessive toward him.

Rebellious and fond of pranks, she did poorly at the Sacred Heart all girls boarding school in Woldingham, except in drama. When she was fifteen she attended a tutorial college in Oxford for A-levels, but went horse-riding more often than she studied. After her father suffered financial reverses when Lloyd's of London crashed, expensive pastimes such as riding stopped. That, and her mother's break-up with a stepfather of whom she was fond, left her confused and without direction, she has said.

In frustration with her behavior, her parents cut off her allowance. Having left home in hopes of a career in show jumping, she found herself, at the age of fifteen, earning her keep by cleaning out horse stables, where she sometimes slept. She credits this period with teaching her about the lives of people who lack wealth.

She enrolled at Emerson College in Boston when she was eighteen to take up news media studies, again finding herself socializing with people who worked hard but earned little. However that did not, by her own account, prompt her to do well at a job as a waitress in a restaurant owned by a relative.

Returning to Europe with a reputation as a "society girl" that she felt obliged to live down, her initial foray into modeling proved challenging. But she was pleased at the opportunity to be represented by a reputable fashion agency.

Paternally, Tamara belongs to the Czartoryski family who were nobles in pre-World War I Poland. She descends also from kings of Spain and France of the House of Bourbon through her grandmother, Princess Dolores de Borbn y Orlans, sister of King Juan Carlos's mother, whose dynastic surname she has appended to her own.

Ancestry