'I'M EUROPEAN'

‘Project Runway’ Host, 53, Poses for Mom-Daughter Lingerie Shoot

The legendary model turned off comments on the duo’s new campaign after earlier ads drew heavy backlash.

Heidi Klum posed in underwear with her daughter more than a year after their first campaign sparked widespread controversy.

The German supermodel and longtime Project Runway host, 53, stripped down to her underwear with her eldest child, Leni Klum, 22, in a new Intimissimi ad, posted on Instagram.

First, the video shows Heidi in front of a mirror in bright daylight, putting a sheer white cashmere shirt over her white lingerie set. Then the video cuts to Leni, whose father is Italian businessman Flavio Briatore, taking off a black lacy shirt at nighttime and revealing her black underwear.

The video goes back and forth between the two, showing the looks from the front and from behind.

“My beloved Ultralight Cashmere shirts are now available in many new designs. Perfect for any day, any time,” Heidi wrote in the caption.

The mother-daughter duo started working with the Italian lingerie brand in 2022, when Leni was 18.

In their inaugural ad together, first posted in 2022, the pair danced in lacy underwear sets in a studio. At the time, commenters called the campaign “odd,” “creepy,” and “wrong on every level.”

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MODEL BEHAVIOR

Heidi Klum Defends Lingerie Photoshoot With Daughter

Nealy Simms

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The pair’s following ads for the brand sparked similar controversy, with people commenting that they had “weird” feelings about a mother and daughter posing together in underwear.

Heidi and Leni’s 2025 ads, for instance, sparked such a backlash that each was eventually compelled to respond.

Both Leni and Heidi have made their stances clear on the criticism surrounding their underwear ads.

“I always try to remember that no matter what you do, there will always be someone who doesn’t like it,” Leni told People in March 2025. “You simply have no control over it, and you can’t focus too much on the negative.”

“A lot of people are like, ‘Oh, I don’t know about mom and daughter doing this together,’” Heidi said to People in July 2025. “But for us? I’m proud of my daughter. She’s fine with me like that.”

Heidi also said her German roots may have affected how she perceived the campaigns.

“I’ve always been very open with my body. When I’m suntanning in the backyard, I might not have a top on,” she said. “I’m European… My kids don’t know me any other way and are probably more easygoing with their bodies because of it.”

In the 2026 campaign, however, the duo did not appear side by side in the video and posted only individual shots on social media. Klum also turned off comments on the Instagram video.

In addition to Leni, Heidi is the mother of Henry Samuel, 21; Johan Samuel, 19; and Lou Samuel, 16.

She welcomed the three children with her second husband, British singer-songwriter Seal Samuel, whom she married in 2005.

Seal also adopted Leni when she was nine, three years before Klum filed for divorce in 2012.

Klum is now married to German Tokio Hotel lead guitarist Tom Kaulitz, 37. A mutual friend introduced the couple in February 2018, and they married a year later in a private ceremony.

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