Behati Prinsloo just went from a rising star in modeling circles to household name after the 24-year-old model got engaged to Maroon 5 frontman Adam Levine.
The couple had only been reunited a short time after a split a few months ago, but it was enough for Levine to pop the question sometime over the weekend. A rep for the singer and judge on The Voice confirmed the engagement in the media on Tuesday.
Levine and Behati Prinsloo met about a year ago, but separated a few months back with Levine moving on to a new woman. But apparently their attraction was too strong, and after reuniting recently Levine surprised many by asking Behati to marry him .
The engagement announcement led to a mad scramble as media outlets tried to learn more about Behati, who shied away from the press during her brief split from Levine. They found details both big (like how she was born in South Africa and raised in Namibia) and small (that those close to Behati call her “Bee”).
Behati Prinsloo actually has an interesting background growing up in Namibia.
“My dad’s a minister and my mom runs a bed and breakfast,” she told Fashionista in 2009. “I’m an only child and pretty much did kid stuff, gymnastics, track, riding, field hockey. I hung out on my friend’s farm a lot.”
Prinsloo actually got discovered while she was paying a visit back to Cape Town, South Africa, thanks to a chance encounter with a talent scout at a grocery store.
“He wrote his number on a piece of paper and my grandfather was like this is so shady,” she said. “So we went home and told my parents about it and they never did anything.”
But for Behati Prinsloo, apparently lightning can strike twice. On another visit to Cape Town she was stopped again, this time by the daughter of model scout Sarah Doukas. The 16-year-old Behati decided to sign, spending the summer modeling in Cape Town before shipping off to London to start her modeling career.
The engagement is a big deal for Levine, who was notorious for his dating around and seemed to be waiting for “the one” to get married. In a May interview , Levine said he probably wouldn’t get married because of the risk of getting divorced (his parents split when he was young).
“If you don’t get married, you can’t get divorced,” he said. “Why couldn’t we learn from the devastatingly low percentage of successful marriages that our last generation went through?”
Apparently, something about Behati Prinsloo makes Adam Levine willing to play the odds.
