She holds both Swedish and United States citizenship.
Born in Prostějov (now in the Czech Republic), she was still a toddler when her father and mother left Czechoslovakia, fleeing the Soviet invasion in 1968, and moved to Lund in southern Sweden.
They left Paulina under the care of their grandmother, believing that their daughter could be brought out later.
However, the Czech authorities would not allow this, and the ensuing battle for Paulina was widely publicized in the Swedish press, making her a cause célèbre.
After a failed rescue attempt, in which her mother was detained by the Czech police, international political pressure led by Olof Palme caused the communist government to allow the Porizkova family to be reunited after seven years.
The reunion was soon ended when the husband left, and the couple filed for divorce.
Father and daughter have been estranged since.
This left Paulina's mother to fund her own medical education, leaving Paulina and her brother Jachym (who was born in the Czech Republic during the mother's house arrest) very much to fend for themselves, including having to steal bread to have something to eat.
Paulina hated her time in Sweden, as she was harassed by her peers for her poverty-stricken political refugee status.
A photographer friend took pictures of Porizkova and sent them to the Elite modeling agency in 1980. At 5 feet 10 1/2 inches (180 cm), she was the perfect height for a fashion model.
Elite head John Casablancas noticed Porizkova's attractiveness and potential, and offered her a ticket to Paris.
It was an extremely tempting offer for a teenager who was eager to get out of Sweden and to support herself.
She quickly rose to become a top model in Paris during the early 1980s, and her fame spread to the United States when she posed in swimwear for Sports Illustrated magazine.
