A fashion icon, model, entrepreneur, advocate of mindful consumption, and now performer, Chau Bui is doing it all.
If you know Chau Bui only from social media—where she has amassed seven million followers, captivated by her effortless elegance and picture-perfect photoshoots—you might assume her trajectory has been charmed. But listen to her speak, and what emerges is far more compelling: a woman in deliberate pursuit of self-discovery, willing to risk vulnerability for the possibility of transformation.
“I worried that my vulnerabilities would be exposed and misunderstood,” Chau Bui tells GRAZIA Malaysia, recalling her decision to appear on Em Xinh Say Hi, a Vietnamese variety show where she performed on stage for the first time. “But at the same time, I felt a strong pull to try something new.” That pull—towards growth, and what lies beyond the familiar—is the current running through Chau Bui’s life right now.
After more than a decade as one of Southeast Asia’s most recognisable fashion forces, the Vietnamese model and entrepreneur is stepping deliberately into new territory. She’s writing music. She’s learning to perform. She’s allowing herself to be seen not as the beautiful content creator who counts Gucci, Dior, and LOEWE among her ongoing collaborators, but as someone still in the process of becoming.
Growing up in Hanoi, Chau Bui absorbed a particular philosophy from her mother: “You don’t need to be the loudest person in the room to be noticed.” It’s a lesson that has informed not just her aesthetic, but her approach to public life. Style, she believes, should tell a story, but it doesn’t need to shout. It doesn’t rely on excess. Authenticity, at the end of the day, is what matters most. Yet a life lived in the public eye, under the gaze of millions, carries its own weight. “I’ve had moments of real self-doubt—wondering who I am to be influencing anyone,” she admits. “Over time, I’ve learned that ‘me’ isn’t a finished product; it’s a work in progress.”
In 2023, burnout—quiet, disguised as success—forced her to step back from work for the first time in ten years. “It taught me that listening to my body, to my health, is not quitting. Knowing my limits is not a weakness.” The experience recalibrated her definition of discipline. For years, she equated productivity with worth. Now, she sees rest as integral to creativity. “When my mind is clear, creativity flows naturally,” she explains. “When it’s not, no amount of productivity can replace that. I now see rest as part of my work, not the opposite of it.”
When asked how she identifies now—fashion icon, entrepreneur, model, influencer—she resists the framing. “All the titles are simply different chapters of the same creative journey,” she says. “At the core, I’m someone who is constantly learning and exploring new aspects of myself. Right now, my goal is not to fit into a label, but to build a life where creativity, business, and self-growth can all thrive.”
This openness to multiplicity has led her to music. On stage during Em Xinh Say Hi, something shifted. “Creating music, being on stage, and sharing that energy with my fans gave me a renewed sense of excitement and purpose,” she recalls. “I want to dive deeper into music as a form of creative expression—not just singing, but also writing, producing, and connecting it with fashion and visuals. I’m not 100% sure where this journey will take me, but I’ve really enjoyed it so far.”
Chau Bui’s decade-long relationships with fashion’s most storied houses have taught her a thing or two about creative longevity. “So much intention and discipline sit behind every creative moment,” she considers. “To create real impact—creatively and socially—you need clarity: knowing who you are and staying true to that, again and again.”
That commitment extends beyond the runway. Over the past five years, Chau Bui has built Sharing Is Caring as a project focused on sustainable fashion, recycling, and mindful consumption. In 2026, she envisions expanding the platform into education and lasting community impact. “For me, sustainability is a lifestyle choice,” she declares. “It shapes many of my decisions, not only in fashion, but also in how I take care of myself, my home, and the people around me.”
Despite her global popularity, Chau Bui remains deeply rooted in Vietnam. Every Tết, she returns home to Hanoi, no matter where work has taken her. “It’s a very special time for me to slow down and be fully present with my family,” she says. She spends time tending her garden, a grounding ritual that has become essential to her sense of equilibrium. “Cleaning up, planting new things, resetting the space—it helps me calm my mind, reflect on the year that’s passed, and feel refreshed as I step into a new one,” she explains.
This year, she’s drawn to colours that reflect her Water element: soft metallics, silver, and shades of blue. “They represent a quieter kind of luck that comes from flow and balance, rather than force,” she says.
When Chau Bui is asked to consider her feelings on luck, she doesn’t hesitate. “Luck, to me, is being prepared when opportunity arrives,” she says. “It’s the result of consistency, courage, and self-trust.” This perspective—luck as preparation meeting opportunity—reveals how Chau Bui approaches both her career and her future. She’s not waiting for the right moment to pursue music, or to expand Sharing Is Caring, or to venture into new creative territories. She’s doing the work. She’s showing up, imperfectly, vulnerably, with the understanding that growth is rarely linear.
She has projects in the works that she can’t yet discuss—cross-disciplinary collaborations that excite her precisely because they push her beyond familiar ground. “I’m putting in the work and trusting that the right people and the right moments will come when the time is right,” she adds. “Hopefully it’ll be sooner rather than later.”
If there’s advice she’d offer her younger self, it would be this: “Trust the pace you’re moving at. Not everything has to happen quickly for it to matter.”
Chau Bui could easily rest on her considerable laurels: the campaigns, the collaborations, the millions of followers. Instead, she’s choosing the harder path: the one that requires her to begin again, to risk failure in pursuit of something more authentic. She mentions Heart Evangelista, the Filipino fashion icon who became one of her first friends during fashion week years ago. “I love her sense of style, her work ethic, and the way she balances life and work, especially with such intense travel schedules,” Chau Bui says. It’s clear she admires resilience, the ability to sustain creativity and grace under pressure. These are the very qualities she’s cultivating in herself.
What’s most striking about Chau Bui is this: she understands that evolution is not about shedding who you were, but about creating space for who you might become. It’s not a rejection of fashion or modelling or the work that made her name. It’s an expansion and a deepening of the self, through the radical act of welcoming all of who you are.
The past year has taught her that vulnerability isn’t weakness. In fact, it could be a source of strength. Now, in 2026, she’s testing that lesson in real time: writing music that expresses what cannot fit in an Instagram caption, building beyond the season’s trends, creating a life as authentic in private as it appears in public. “It feels scary at times, but also incredibly exciting—and that’s exactly the kind of energy I want to move forward with.”
Photography: Kolt Huynh
Creative Direction & Styling: Joseph Cheng
Producer: Trang Ơi
Art Direction: Nadia Aswardy
Hair: Quan Lê
Makeup: Xi Quan Lê
Lighting: Harry Nguyen
Retouch: Nguyễn Hoàng Hiệp
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