Kseniya Sobchak - Biography

Biography

As a child she attended the ballet school attached to the Mariinsky Theatre and the Hermitage Museum art school. In 1998, Ksenia left the school attached to Herzen University, and enrolled at the Saint Petersburg State University (Department of International Relations). In 2001 she moved to Moscow and enrolled in the International Relations program at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations. In 2002 she enrolled in a masters program at the department of politics at the same university.

Sobchak acted in the 2004 film Thieves and Prostitutes.

She is also known as a clothes designer and promoter of rubber boots. In June 2006 she created her first collection of such boots.

In 2004, Sobchak was identified as a candidate to become Russia's first national Space Tourist, flying to the International Space Station aboard a Soyuz rocket. She may have undertaken some initial tests and cosmonaut training, but the project came to nothing.

She also acted against the newly produced law that prohibits sharing of private lives of Russian celebrities without their permission.

On 28 December 2008, Sobchak was on an Aeroflot flight from Moscow to New York when she and other passengers determined that the pilot was drunk prior to take-off. Sobchak used her socialite status to call Aeroflot representatives and remove the pilot from the cockpit.

Russia's Tatler magazine made the list of most desirable single women in the country. The list is based on women's fortune and their celebrity status. She is known across Russia as a socialite, TV host and presenter. Ksenia is Russia's No.1 'it girl', an analogue to Paris Hilton.