• February 18, 2008
• Vol. 69
• No. 6

The French President & The Model Married!

By Bob Meadows

A Sudden Divorce, a New Love And, Now, a Wedding. Nicolas Sarkozy Doesn't Mess Around

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From PEOPLE Magazine

The French have a term for it: déjà vu. There they were again, French president Nicolas Sarkozy, fresh from his October divorce, and supermodel-turned-singer Carla Bruni, who once dated Mick Jagger, strolling in the gardens of the palace at Versailles Feb. 2, just as they had when they took their romance public less than two months earlier. Only this time, there was a difference: Bruni and Sarkozy were wearing wedding rings. "They seemed very loving," says a witness. "They kissed and cuddled and walked hand in hand."

The wedding was just as intimate. Bruni, 39, in a sleeveless, off-white Hermès dress, and Sarkozy, 53, wearing a dark suit, exchanged vows during a 20-minute civil service earlier that day at the presidential palace, witnessed by 30 loved ones, including children from their previous marriages. (Nowhere in sight: Cécilia Sarkozy, the president's ex-wife of 11 years, with whom he split last October five months after being sworn in.) "They had the air of being very emotional and in love," says François Lebel, mayor of Paris's eighth district, who performed the ceremony. Newspapers in Italy, where Bruni was born and lived before moving to France and modeling for Chanel and Yves Saint Laurent, reported that the couple are already expecting, but the president's office has not commented. In any event, the mother of the bride seems content the union—his third, her second—is now legal. As Marisa Borini told Le Parisien newspaper, "I'm very happy for my daughter and also certainly for the president."

• Contributors:
• Reported by Peter Mikelbank/Paris.