The Kokomo Tribune from Kokomo, Indiana • Page 54

IN STEP WITH: BY JAMES BRADY VEJNDELA Born: Vendela Kirsebom on Jan. 12,1967, in Stockholm, Sweden. Modeling: Discovered by Eileen Ford in a Swedish restaurant when she was 13; worked for Ford Models in Europe, 1987-89; started working in New York City, 1989. Became "the face" of Elizabeth Arden, 1989, On cover of 1993 Sports Illustrated annual swimsuit issue and Sports Illustrated 1993 desk calendar. I WAS A TOUGH ASSIGNMENT, I knew, but someone had to do it.

Which was why, on a recent afternoon, I found myself at a small table off the lobby of the Plaza Athe'ne'e Hotel in Manhattan, sipping cappuccino with a young Swedish woman named Vendela, who has been called this year's "most beautiful living cover girl." Vendela (she pronounces it VEN- de-lah) was on the cover of the Sports Illustrated annual swimsuit issue earlier this year and has a multiyear contract with Elizabeth Arden as "the face" of the cosmetic giant's ad campaigns. She'd just wrapped a pilot for a comedy series called The Wyatts for Fox Television. She has two brothers back in Sweden, an apartment in New York and a house in Beverly Hills. So she's doing pretty well, right? "I'm kind of boring," she told me over coffee. "I start mornings at 7 with Sam Chawt working on her voice, polishing away the last traces of an then I shower and run to the studio.

For two years, I was studying acting every night, but only two times a week now. When I get home, I turn on the news and cook a little dinner. Sometimes I go out dancing. I love dancing. And I have been involved with someone for three years Jon Peters, Barbra Streisand's old but no wedding bells.

I'm too busy. "I do want to get married," Vendela added, "and I want four of my own and two adopted, maybe. A lot of girls!" She was only a kid herself when the American model agent Eileen Ford discovered her during a talent-spotting tour of Europe. "I was 13 and having dinner in a restaurant in Stockholm, in 'the old Vendela recalled, "and she came over and-looked at me and said, 'You better come to New Then, when she realized my age, she said, 'You better stay in At 17, Vendela decided to try the modeling game after all. Already pretty shrewd and aware that "New York is tough," she went off to learn the business in Milan.

She worked in Europe until 1989, when she came to New York for a three-week trip and ended up staying. The Arden people, who had seen her on the cover of French Vogue, contacted Eileen Ford and signed her up. Now, apparently, it's time for the next career step. "I'm very very serious he was the swimsuit cover girl. She's in a new TV pilot.

But the beautiful model Vendela says, "I'm kind of boring." about acting," she said. "I work very hard at it. I want to be great at it. My accent is a problem." In The Wyam pilot, she plays a substitute professor at a university with whom a young man falls in love. "It's in the can," she said.

"We have to wait. I hope they pick it up." But for all this, Vendela retains a sort of little-girl enthusiasm: "I'm so excited about my new press kit. Have you seen it?" And of Elizabeth Arden: "They are like my second family. We have so much fun, and I'm so comfortable with them." What about fashion modeling on the runways in Paris and Milan? "I love being onstage," she says. "When I'm in front of the camera, the more people on the set, the better.

I love the applause. I guess I'm a total ham." JH Brady's Bits She's 5 feet 7, has blue eyes and looks to be in reasonably good shape. (She skis, plays a little tennis, runs, swims, does weights and works out.) She also has a sense of humor, People magazine reported that, while she vacuums, Vendela listens to the opera La Trawata. "Yes," she told me, "I said that, and someone wrote to me: 'And when you vacuum, do you wear high heelsP'" Some note a resemblance to the young Grace Kelly. "She is absolutely someone I admired," said Vendela, "so it is a great compliment.

And we both have high cheekbones. Karl Lagerfeld took pictures of me that reminded me of but not in every picture." PAGE 14 AUGUST 8,1893 PARADE MAGAZINE.