A Vogue Cover Model Sleeping Beside a Cash Machine

Nastasia Urbano worked as a model for clothing and perfume brands and appeared on magazine covers, including Vogue. At one point she signed contracts worth about one million dollars, roughly 880,000 euros, for 20 days of work. She remembers dining with Andy Warhol, going to parties with Melanie Griffith and being invited to Madonna's wedding to Sean Penn. When her agency required a new name, she invented her own.

In early 2019 the Portuguese newspaper Observador reported that she had been sleeping on the streets of Barcelona for three months. She first slept beside a cash machine, and at the time of the report she slept outdoors with her dog, Jack, wearing a coat given to her by a friend named Toni. Toni occasionally let her sleep on his sofa, though she said that was always temporary.

She explained how she had reached this point. She met her ex-husband in Barcelona during visits to her parents, and she said she had financed his failed projects blindly. After seven years of marriage she worked temporarily caring for people and children from 2000, but did not earn enough. She said she could not afford an apartment, and that renting one would leave her with no money for food, electricity or water.

She recalled her earlier life with a short phrase: she had everything and lived like a queen.

By the time of the interview she said she was tired of surviving by asking for money and wanted to live rather than merely survive. She has children who, she said, do what they can to help her.