Paulina Porizkova says being called “still beautiful” at 61 is not a compliment. In a video posted April 16, the legendary supermodel said the word “still” turns beauty into something frozen, as she got ready for bed in pink lingerie and a floral robe.
“The word ‘still’ implies in the sentence exactly what it says: Still, which means unmoving, remaining the same, unchanged,” Porizkova said. She asked why that is treated as an achievement in older women and argued that change is praised when people are young but becomes something women are expected to stop doing once they are older.
In the video, Porizkova said the pressure goes beyond appearance. She said that at some point in a woman’s life, generally after she is deemed done with childbearing, women are expected not to learn anything new. “If we still want a seat at the table in society, well, then we have to focus on being still,” she said, adding: “Still good-looking. Still attractive. Still beautiful. Still.”
Porizkova, now a model, actress, influencer and author, has spent decades in the public eye. She rose to fame internationally in the 1980s after being discovered as a teenager in Europe, then appeared on the cover of the 1984 Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue, becoming one of the youngest models ever to do so. She also had a long-running contract with Estée Lauder and released her book No Filter: The Good, the Bad, and the Beautiful in 2022.
Her April 16 remarks resonated with many fans because they put a sharp name to a familiar insult: the idea that a woman’s value is tied to whether she can keep looking unchanged. Porizkova’s point was not that beauty should disappear with age, but that it should not be treated as a surprise when it lasts.
