By Nadia Salemme

Copyright news

After debuting as one of Sports Illustrated’s rookies in the magazine’s closely watched swimsuit issue in 2008, Gomes went on to achieve a wild level of popularity in South Korea – to the point she needed to hire private security – while appearing in local TV shows and commercials.

She was the voice of mega producer Rick Ross’s tag line (“Maybach music!”), having recorded it in a studio alongside Ross and rapper Jay-Z.

And, of course, there was her longstanding reign as the face of retail giant David Jones, a position she held from 2012 to 2019.

“It feels like I’ve been in the public eye my whole life and I don’t know anything else,” Gomes tells Stellar.

“I’ve gone through so many stages of fame. When I shot Sports Illustrated in New York in my early 20s, people would recognise me from the magazine. It was a big deal back then. It wasn’t digital – the swimsuit issue was a magazine, on the stands, once a year. [Then, in Korea] I would have crowds at the airport when I landed.”

As she joins Stellar for a photo shoot in Byron Bay to mark her 40th birthday (which fell on September 25; “I’m a Libra … can you tell?”), Gomes admits the popular NSW resort town – where she now lives – has been on her wish list for a shoot locale.

“It’s just a different energy here, different beaches,” Gomes says, when asked how it compares to Perth, where she grew up.

Listen to Jessica Gomes on the Stellar podcast, Something To Talk About:

“Western Australia feels a bit more like California – it’s dry, it’s a bit more like the desert.”

And Gomes would know, having lived in Los Angeles for nearly a decade before returning home to Australia in 2020.

But her day-to-day lifestyle is much more laid-back in Byron, where her social circle includes model Gemma Ward, actors Teresa Palmer and Isabel Lucas, fashion designer Laura May of Nagnata, and model Gabriella Brooks (who recently announced her engagement to Australian actor Liam Hemsworth).

“I have the best group of girlfriends. [Byron] does feel like a mini LA for me,” Gomes says. “We all went to Teresa’s house and made vision boards. Everyone’s kind of on the same page in Byron in terms of the woo-woo stuff.

“Like, everyone’s down for going to a tea ceremony. It’s not just about drinking or going out to a fancy restaurant.

“There was a stage in Byron where there were a lot of paparazzi here, but I feel like that’s died down.”

When Gomes – who is half Singaporean-Chinese and half Portuguese by descent – began modelling professionally around two decades ago, it came with the attendant interest in her personal life (which she politely declines to discuss).

“It’s kind of weird when you’re dealing with it and there’s a lot of action around your name. “It gets a bit crazy when you’re a hot topic, or you’re in a relationship and that’s in the public eye.

“I feel like I live a pretty chill, private life now, and I’m comfortable with that.

“I know who I am, and it’s nice to be in this phase where I’m still modelling, still in the industry, and just really enjoying my work and the people around me.”

As she enters a new decade, Gomes says she’s feeling “so good about ageing. I feel freer and freer as I get older”.

“I feel way more funny, more confident, and way more myself; I’m not trying to be someone else. For me, it doesn’t have anything to do with how you look. It’s cool to age. It’s a privilege.

“I’ve made it. I’m proud to have made it through a tough industry, and kind of turned out normal.”

That said, Gomes admits there have been periods of her life when “everything was crazy. I look back at certain chapters [and think] whoa”.

“You’re not even realising it at the time, because you’re in it and you don’t have the perspective yet.

“I’ve always tried to keep my moral compass in place. It can be quite sad when you see people make the wrong choices and going down the wrong road.

“Things can get messy, especially when fame is involved. Fame does not equal happiness, I know that for a fact.

“I’ve had big peaks in the course of my career, and it wasn’t always my happiest times.”

As a child, Gomes dreamt of becoming an actor, and she says she still has “a big burning desire” to pursue the profession.

She had roles in the 2014 sci-fi action film Transformers: Age Of Extinction starring Mark Wahlberg, the 2017 comedies Once Upon A Time In Venice with Bruce Willis and Father Figures with Owen Wilson, and director Alan Yang’s 2020 Netflix drama Tigertail.

While she admits she is “hot and cold” on acting at the moment, preferring to channel her creativity elsewhere, Gomes does reveal her ambitions are ongoing.

“Gemma and I have written a script,” she says.

“I have so many ideas. We always talk about it. When I lived in LA, I auditioned a lot.

“It was frustrating because I was getting cast as the ‘hot girlfriend’.

“I feel like I haven’t had a chance to show my full scope. It can be kind of blinding, the whole Hollywood thing.”

Listen to Jessica Gomes on the Stellar podcast, Something To Talk About:

See the full cover shoot with Jessica Gomes in today’s Stellar via the Sunday papers – and listen to her on a new episode of the Stellar podcast, Something To Talk About, out now, wherever you get your podcasts.

Originally published as ‘I live a pretty chill, private life now’: Model Jessica Gomes on fame, Hollywood and entering a new era