Michelle and Barack Obama met when they were both working at law firm Sidley Austin. Michelle was actually Barack's mentor when he joined the firm, which Michelle put down to the fact that they both attended Harvard. The pair tied the knot in 1992 at Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago.
The 44th President of the United States, serving from 2009 to 2017, Democrat Barack Obama was the first African-American president. Since he left office, Barack has been helping to plan the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago's South Side, which will serve as a presidential library and training center. The couple signed a deal with Netflix in May 2018, and in August 2019 they released the movie American Family, a documentary about a glass factory opened by a Chinese billionaire in Ohio.
Although propelled to fame by her husband's very public role, Michelle was extremely successful in her own right before she became First Lady in 2008. She trained as a lawyer and worked in the public sector in Chicago, earning an impressive salary of $273,618 in 2006, equivalent to $348,482 (£270.4k) today, from her role at University of Chicago Hospitals. She has since gone on to sell more than 10 million copies of her autobiography Becoming, with 1.4 million copies being bought in its first week of release alone. This makes it one of the fastest-selling nonfiction titles ever and the best-selling book of 2018. A film following her 34-city book tour with the memoir was released on Netflix in early May this year.
Jerry Hall is best known for her relationship with Mick Jagger, which lasted 22 years and gave her four children, although she has always had a successful career of her own. The Texan model built up quite a fortune from her modeling days in the 1970s and 1980s, and even transitioned into acting in the 1980s, appearing in Urban Cowboy (1980) and Batman (1989). She has an estimated net worth of around $15 million (£11.6m). While that's definitely not to be sniffed at, her husband has a little more buying power...
The Australia-born media mogul owns two giant media conglomerates: NewsCorp and Fox Corporation. After inheriting his journalist father's newspaper in Australia he went on to scoop up the likes of The Times in London and 20th Century Fox, which he later sold to Disney for $71.3 billion (£58.3bn). The 89-year-old Murdoch and his family are currently worth a whopping $17.3 billion (£14.1bn), according to Forbes.
Singer John Legend met supermodel Chrissy Teigen when she starred in the music video for his song Stereo in 2007. They married six years later in Lake Como, Italy, and have two children, Luna and Miles. Both of them had impressive careers behind them before they got together.
Teigen was disovered as a model in her teenage years. She flourished in the industry and went on to be named the third highest-paid supermodel in the world in 2017 by Forbes, bringing in $13.5 million (£10.4m) that year. She has since branched out into television presenting, and launched the first of two cookbooks in 2016 called Cravings, which was followed up by Cravings: Hungry For More. This foray into cooking led to Teigen's collaboration with US chain Target, where she created her own cookware line (she's pictured in a Target store with her mother).
Unsurprisingly the majority of Legend's wealth and success has come from his music career, with his touring and songwriting helping him to amass an estimated fortune of $40 million (£32.7m), according to sources including the Daily Mail. The singer has also turned his hand to a bit of acting, starring in modern musical La La Land (2016), albeit as a singer, as well as taking the lead in a live TV adaptation of musical Jesus Christ Superstar in 2018, for which he won an Emmy.
Snapchat founder Evan Spiegel and Australian model Miranda Kerr got married in 2017 after two of years of dating. The couple have two children, Hart, two, and Myles, who was born in October last year. Kerr also has a son, Flynn, who is nine, from her previous marriage to actor Orlando Bloom. Between them, the pair have a pretty impressive array of achievements.
Spiegel came up with the idea for Snapchat while studying at Stanford University, launching it along with classmate Bobby Murphy in 2011. The tech entrepreneur dropped out to create the app and just two years later Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg attempted to buy it for $3 billion (£2.4bn), but was turned down. Spiegel, who is 29, is one of just three self-made billionaires in the world under 30, with a net worth of $3.8 billion (£3.1bn) according to Forbes.
Miranda Kerr was touted as a model when she was just 13, after winning a magazine modeling contest, and she went on to become the first Australian Victoria's Secret Angel. Since then she's launched a successful skincare business, KORA Organics, in 2009, which was 95% self-funded. The brand is currently distributed to 25 countries and has an exclusive partnership with US beauty retailer Sephora, with an estimated value of $13.2 billion (£10.2bn) in 2018. Kerr's personal net worth has been estimated at $45 million (£36.8m).
David and Victoria Beckham, or Posh and Becks as they're known in their native UK, have undergone quite a few transformations during their 21-year marriage. The 'it' couple tied the knot in July 1999, shortly after the birth of their first child, Brooklyn, in March that year. They have four children: Brooklyn, 21, Romeo, 17, Cruz, 15, and Harper, eight.
Superstar footballer David Beckham retired seven years ago, leaving an impressive sporting career behind him. The player started out at Manchester United in 1992, winning two Premier League titles, two FA Cups and an Intercontinental Cup with the club, leaving to play for Real Madrid 11 years later. He then played for LA Galaxy, AC Milan and Paris Saint-Germain before hanging up the football boots. Since then, he's scored a whole host of lucrative endorsement deals with brands including Adidas, Armani, H&M, Sainsbury's and more. He's currently creating his own Major League Soccer team in Miami, which was set to make its debut in 2020 but will now wait until next season due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Victoria Beckham first entered the limelight as 'Posh Spice' in the girl band the Spice Girls. However, after some modeling she began a career in fashion, launching a denim label – dvb Style – in 2007, and following up with her fashion line Victoria Beckham Fashion the next year. The brand is currently stuggling with losses, which were at $13.3 billion (£10.2bn) in 2017, despite a 17% rise in sales. But Victoria launched a hotly-anticipated beauty line in September, Victoria Beckham Beauty, which is being sold exclusively online. The power couple have a combined net worth of $453 million (£370m) according to the Sunday Times Rich List 2020.
They may be less well known than some celebrity couples on our list, but former Yahoo! CEO Marissa Mayer and tech investor Zachary Bogue are known to be one of Silicon Valley's most successful power couples. The pair got married in San Francisco in 2009 and have three children together.
After graduating from Stanford University in 1999 with a bachelor's and master's in Computer Science, Mayer started her career at Google as one of the firm's first employees. She worked there for 13 years before jumping ship to become CEO of Yahoo! in 2012. Her tenure there was not so successful, but she now has a fortune of $620 million (£507m), according to Forbes, and in 2018 she co-founded technology company Lumi Labs, which focuses on building consumer applications using artificial intelligence.
Mayer's husband Zachary Bogue is a lawyer-turned-investor and adviser for data start-ups. Bogue has gone on to co-found Data Collective, a group of venture capitalists, entrepreneurs and engineers which invests in data-focused companies. He has a rumored net worth of $300 million (£231m), around half of his wife's.
Meg Whitman, as the former CEO of both eBay and Hewlett-Packard, is the most well-known of this couple. Yet her husband is just as much a high achiever as his wife...
Whitman started off her career as a brand manager and consultant. In 1998, she became CEO at eBay, taking the company from $5.7 million to $8 billion in sales over the course of a decade. In 2011, she became CEO of Hewlett Packard, overseeing its split into two different companies, HP Inc. and Hewlett Packard Enterprise, in 2015. She also ran for California governor, in 2010, albeit unsuccessfully, and more recently co-founded short-form video maker Quibi. Her net worth, according to Forbes, is $4.6 billion (£3.7bn).
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Whitman's husband is Dr Griffith R. Harsh IV, a brain surgeon who has risen to the top of his game. Following in his father's footsteps, he decided to pursue a career in neurosurgery and obtained degrees at Oxford and Harvard Medical School, before working at the neurosurgery department of the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). He has made several advancements in his field, including creating a device that lowers the risk of radiation therapy for patients with brain tumors. The scientist is the author of more than 200 peer-reviewed publications.
In an ornate wedding ceremony at Kew Gardens, London in August 2019, controversial gaming vlogger Felix Kjellberg – better known as PewDiePie – tied the knot with fellow social media star Marzia Bisognin. The pair had been together for eight years and have racked up 107 million YouTube subscribers, more than 27 million Instagram followers and more than 176 million Twitter followers between them.
Swedish gamer and YouTuber Felix Kjellberg is probably the better-known half of this couple. He founded his YouTube channel PewDiePie in 2010 and became an instant hit for his gaming videos. Yet his success hasn’t been without controversy. In 2017 he received global backlash after uploading videos containing anti-Semitic jokes and was later decried for using a racist slur against a fellow gamer in a live stream. He responded to both controversies by posting apology videos on his channel. Forbes has estimated his net worth at $13 million (£10.6m), but the online star has contested the valuation, and said that in reality his wealth is much more.
Italian social media star Marzia Bisognin built her success through vlogging, posting videos about fashion and beauty on her YouTube channel. She quit vlogging in 2018 due to mental health reasons, and has since launched two online brands: Maì, a jewelry and home décor company, and Tsuki, a clothing and accessories line. She has 7.6 million followers on Instagram.
Arguably one of the most famous power couples in the world, Beyoncé Knowles and Jay-Z (real name Shawn Carter) have gained legendary status, yet still try to keep their private lives a mystery. The pair began dating secretly in around 2001, collaborating on the hit song Crazy in Love in 2003. In 2008, they got married in a private ceremony in New York. They have three children: Blue Ivy, and twins Sir and Rumi.
Singer Beyoncé first hit the spotlight as part of girl band Destiny’s Child in the 1990s, before launching her first solo album, Dangerously in Love, in 2003. The album received rave reviews and she won an impressive five Grammy Awards the following year. She has gone on to have an incredibly successful music career, having sold over 118 million solo albums, making her one of the highest-selling artists of all time. Last year she launched a documentary, Homecoming, which has earned her $60 million (£49m) as part of a Netflix deal.
In 1989, Jay-Z started his career as part of a rap group, which landed him with the nickname by which he’s known best. In 1996, he released his debut album, which achieved moderate success, and two years later, he rose to fame with the album Hard Knock Life. Following a break between 2003-2006, he has since released several other highly-successful albums, and collaborated with Kanye West and Justin Timberlake. He part-owns basketball team the New Jersey Jets and has investments in Armand de Brignac champagne and Uber, which have helped him build a $1 billion (£817m) net worth. Forbes has dubbed him the world's first hip-hop billionaire.
Tom Brady got his big break when he started playing for the Patriots NFL team in 2000, after playing college football at the University of Michigan. He stayed with the Patriots for 20 seasons, winning records for the most regular season wins, the most Super Bowl wins and the most passing touchdowns in playoff history, before leaving the team following the 2019 season. Brady has since joined the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on a $50 million (£40.9m) contract. The couple have a combined net worth of $580 million (£474m).
Gisele Bünchen was scouted as a model when she was a teenager, leaving Brazil for New York in 1997 to pursue her modeling career. In 2000, she scored a contract with Victoria’s Secret, which led to her becoming the highest-paid model in the world for 10 years on the trot. She has since published an autobiography, Lessons: My Path to a Meaningful Life, in 2018, which became a New York Times best-seller shortly after it was released.
Salma Hayek and François-Henri Pinault have now been married for more than a decade, having wed in April 2009. The actress, who is of Lebanese and Mexican descent, met the fashion CEO when they were both in their 40s before marrying and having their daughter, Valentina.
Hayek initially found fame in Mexico, taking on the title role in soap opera Teresa when she was 23 years old. Moving to Los Angeles in 1991, she landed a few smaller roles before being cast alongside Antonio Banderas in cult movie Desperado (1995), which signaled a big break for her. Her notable achievements include co-producing and starring in Frida (2002), which told the story of Mexican artist Frida Kahlo. The 53-year-old movie star and her family have homes in London, Paris and California. She is now the sixth richest woman in Britain, according to the Sunday Times Rich List 2020, sharing a fortune of $8 billion (£6.6bn) with her husband.
After launching customer relationship management company Soft Computing while studying at business school in Paris, Hayek's husband François-Henri Pinault joined the family firm Kering in 1987 when it was still called Pinault Distribution. The group specializes in luxury fashion, owning brands such as Yves Saint Laurent, Alexander McQueen and Gucci. As Kering's Chairman and CEO since 2005, Pinault has prioritized sustainability, earning the company a place on the Carbon Disclosure Project's Climate Change "A" list 2019 for green actions. Pinault's family's wealth is currently estimated at $32.4 billion (£26.5bn), according to Forbes.
Media mogul Barry Diller and fashion designer Diane Von Furstenberg may have got together later in life, but that doesn’t make them any less of a power couple. The pair have been married for 19 years and split their time between homes in Connecticut and New York.
Barry Diller started his career in TV, working at ABC, Paramount Pictures and 20th Century Fox. He became Chairman of Expedia in 2005, and held the position of CEO at IAC, which owns Match.com, Tinder and OkCupid, between 1995-2010. The New York Times named him the highest-paid executive of 2005, earning a total $295 million that year, equivalent to $388 million (£298m) in today’s money.
Diane Von Furstenberg’s big break came when she designed the iconic wrap dress in 1974, four years after launching her eponymous label. The dress achieved sales of over one million after just two years and became an instant staple item in women’s wardrobes. She went on to launch cosmetics and fragrance lines, worked as a contributing editor at Vanity Fair and publishing several books including an autobiography titled Diane: A Signature Life. The couple are rumored to have a combined net worth of $4.3 billion (£3.5bn).
Tennis champion Serena Williams married Reddit founder Alexis Ohanian in November 2017, after giving birth to their daughter Alexis Olympia Ohanian Jr in September of that year. The pair had been dating since 2015 but kept things relatively quiet on social media for the first year of dating. Announcing the engagement, Serena shared a post on Reddit along with a poem she had written and a cartoon created by Ohanian.
Pictured after winning Wimbledon in 2016 for the seventh time – the first was in 2002 – Williams has been one of the world's top tennis players for nearly two decades. The Olympian even managed to win the Australian Open in 2017 while eight weeks pregnant with her baby daughter. However, she had never heard of the website that gave her future husband success until she met him in 2015...
Alexis Ohanian launched news aggregator and forum Reddit in 2005, at the age of just 22, with fellow University of Virginia graduate Steve Huffman. They sold Reddit to publishing giant Condé Nast for a reported $10 million in 2006. He wrote the best-selling book Without Their Permission: How the 21st Century Will Be Made, Not Managed, in 2013. Forbes declared the internet entrepreneur the "mayor of the Internet" in 2012. Ohanian now runs a Venture Capital firm Initialized Capital, which has invested in firms such as AdQuick, a digital out-of-home advertising service. In fact, Ohanian has invested $2.1 million (£1.7m) in AdQuick in 2018, and recently used the firm to buy a billboard in Time Square for a COVID-19 'Staying home means saving lives' message.
Hollywood actor George Clooney married international human rights lawyer Amal Alamuddin in Venice in 2014. While not necessarily as well-known to the public as Clooney, Alamuddin is one of the most highly-regarded lawyers in her field. The pair have two children together, twins Ella and Alexander, who were born in June 2017.
Alamuddin is a barrister specializing in international human rights law and has worked in the Netherlands and Beirut, Lebanon. She has represented some extremely high-profile clients throughout the course of her career, including Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Her husband once remarked: "I get to see someone at the absolute top of their game doing a job better than anybody I've ever seen."
George is no stranger to success either. The actor has won two Academy Awards: Best Supporting Actor for Syriana (2005), and Best Picture for his role as a producer on Argo (2013). The pair now split their time between homes in England, LA and Como, Italy. He also sold his tequila brand Casamigos to drinks giant Diageo in 2017 for a reported $700 million (£543m) upfront. In 2018 Forbes estimated his net worth at $239 million (£195m).
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