If you're even remotely online, you've likely encountered her while scrolling social media: a silver-haired woman gliding through fashionable locales, from the sidewalks of New York City to the beaches of Cayman Island, in a seemingly endless stream of impeccable outfits.
Think: JW Anderson's dolphin tank paired with Miu Miu's silk briefs; an adidas track jacket styled with Acne Studio jorts and a Bottega Veneta bag; monogrammed Gucci sweatpants and pointy Prada mules.
So who exactly is this stylish woman, whose gray bob and eclectic wardrobe has landed her front row seats at fashion week? Her name is Grece Ghanem, and she's a 59-year-old microbiologist-turned-fashion-influencer with a whopping 1.5 million followers.
Ghanem earned her master's degree in microbiology in her native Lebanon, where she first worked as a hospital lab technician. In 2005, she and her daughter, Cheyenne, moved to Montreal, where Ghanem began working as a personal trainer.
When Ghanem joined Instagram in 2015, she didn't set out to become an influencer. Encouraged by her daughter, who'd let her browse street style photos on her Instagram account, Ghanem began posting photos of her outfits for fun. “It began as a hobby — we would always take ‘fashion’ photos while we were traveling," she told British Vogue in 2021. "We decided that if we were going to share the photos she took of me, we would do it in a curated way and with purpose.”
In 2017, Vice featured her in a short video titled "We Meet an Instagram Model Who Started in Her 50s." Just a few weeks later, she appeared on the fashion blog Advanced Style. Quickly, Ghanem's following began to grow — onlookers were enchanted by her stylish subversion of what we often expect older women to dress like.
In an interview with Glamour, Ghanem summed up her ethos: "I strongly believe that women should remain visible no matter their age and have the freedom to dress as they please."
Since signing with Storm Model Management in 2020, Ghanem has worked with brands like By Terry, Missoma, Club Monaco, and Mango. Clearly, she's been a fixture of the fashion scene for a while — but Ghanem reentered the chat in late 2023, when photos of her began circulating across Twitter.
Keep your eyes peeled for Ghanem when the Fall/Winter 2024 womenswear shows kick off in February. Who knows — as designers begin to embrace age-inclusive casting, we might just see Ghanem make an appearance on the catwalk.
