The Fairest Lady

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Today would have been screen icon Audrey Hepburn's 68th birthday. Here, Vera Brozzoni charts the remarkable life and personality of a woman who still epitomises the essence of style and grace.

With her doe-eyed face and slender figure Audrey Hepburn is still an icon, her image synonymous with effortless chic.

Perhaps the reason her memory continues to stand the test of time is her unique style. When she first appeared on the big screen at the end of the 50s, she immediately showed an innovative kind of femininity.

It was the heyday for curvy and busty stars, but Hepburn conquered the audience with a thin figure and almost frail physical complexion.

Her shape had a mix of immaturity and sensual allure that looked out of her time back then – but nowadays it's totally modern: women now strive for bodies more similar to Audrey Hepburn's than to Elizabeth Taylor's: linear and aerodynamic, willowy and gamine.

It is no accident that French couturier Givenchy, who designed her costumes for Sabrina, liked her so much that he became her life-long friend and designed much of her personal wardrobe. Her peculiar sexiness eschewed killer glances and femme fatale's hip movements; rather than a savage man-eater such as Brigitte Bardot, or Marilyn Monroe's playful pocket-Venus Hepburn was a sophisticated kitten who could radiate sheer joy or cast a spell through her enchanting eyes and cool freshness.

On set, she was said to be a graceful and cheerful presence:
"All I want for Christmas is another picture with Audrey Hepburn", stated Cary Grant after working with her in Charade (1963), a wish that was never actually fulfilled.

Many of her male acting partners, including Rex Harrison and Gregory Peck became friends and she met her husband Mel Ferrer on stage in 1954, playing Ondine.

Talking about herself, she said "I was born with an enormous need for affection, and a terrible need to give it."

Hepburn's warm-heartedness passed a very harsh test during her cruel teenage years: growing up in the Netherlands with her mother and brothers (her father, a Nazi sympathizer, had left the family), she saw her relatives being shot by the Nazi in front of her, suffered malnutrition and developed various diseases. She also served in the Red Cross as a nurse taking care of a British tank commander, Terence Young who went on to become a filmmaker and in 1967 directed her in thriller Wait Until Dark.

After the war, she tried to support her family by exploiting her talent as a ballerina, but then switched to a better-paid job: acting. And that's how it all began.

Despite her stardom, Hepburn never forgot her bleak war-time days and, after her last film role in 1988, dedicated her time entirely to UNICEF.

As an ambassador she travelled across a large part of the Third World icluding Ethiopia, Turkey and Central and South America.

There she remembered her hard times but also saw how humanitarian commitment can change lives.

Of her trip to Venezuela and Ecuador she said: "When they see UNICEF their faces light up, because they know that something is happening. In the Sudan, for example, they call a water pump UNICEF".

For this only reason, if not for her stylishness, Audrey Hepburn deserves to be remembered and appreciated; generous and unselfish, she translated her stardom into care as she previously did on set.

It is no wonder that kids adored her; UN photographer John Isaac testifies that "Often the kids would have flies all over them, but she would just go hug them. Children would just come up to hold her hand, touch her - she was like the Pied Piper."

A life well spent; thank you, Audrey.

For more information on UNICEF visit www.unicef.org.uk

• 1929: on the 4th May Audrey Kathleen Hepburn-Ruston is born in Brussels, Belgium
• 1948: takes ballet lessons with ballerina Marie Rambert
• 1953: wins an Academy Award for Roman Holidays as Princess Ann
• 1954: is nominated to an Academy Award for Sabrina as Sabrina
• 1954: marries actor Mel Ferrer (and divorces him in 1968)
• 1961: stars in Breakfast At Tiffany's as Holly Golightly
• 1964: stars in My Fair Lady as Eliza Doolittle
• 1988: last film appearance in Always as an angel
• 1992: is presented with the USA Presidential Medal of Freedom in recognition of her work with UNICEF
• 1993: dies of colon cancer in Tolochenaz, Switzerland

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