Growing up in the public eye! Kendall Jenner got her start on Keeping Up With the Kardashians, but she’s since gone on to make a name for herself in the modeling world.

In 2018, Kendall was dubbed the highest-paid model in the world by Forbes, and her stardom is still growing. But don’t think that her career was handed to her because of her family. The model made it clear during the July 2021 KUWTK reunion special that her family’s fame hindered rather than helped her come up in the fashion world.

“In the topic of offensiveness to some of the things people assume about our family, I think everyone around me, whether friends or family, knows how hard I worked and still work,” she explained. “I did everything that I was supposed to do and had to do to get to the position I’m at now as a model. I went to every single casting, ran all over not only New York City but all over Europe trying to get a job and make my way.”

Kendall added, “Of course I had a platform, I never took that for granted. I always knew that was there, but that almost made my job a little bit harder only because people probably didn’t want to hire me because I was on a reality TV show.”

Ultimately, she made it in the modeling world, having since walked the runway for major high-end brands over the years. Something else Kendall has become known for since her family stepped into the spotlight is her dating history. While the reality TV alum debuted her relationship with Devin Booker in 2020, she hasn’t always been so open to sharing her romantic life with the public.

“I feel like it’s always worked better to me that way,” Kendall also said during the KUWTK reunion. “No offense to my older sisters at all, but I think that Kylie [Jenner] and I specifically have had the opportunity to watch my older sisters go through marriages, relationships and breakups and all of these things and do them pretty publicly.”

Out of all the Kardashian-Jenner family members, it’s safe to say that Kendall is the most subdued when it comes to social media. But she’s definitely stepped out of her shell more since the show’s premiere in 2007.

“Anything I do, I always want to be 100 percent in it and know I want to be doing it,” she shared with Vogue Australia in June 2019. “When I started I was so young, so if it didn’t work out then I was going to figure it out. I’d cross that bridge when I got there.”

Scroll through our gallery to see how Kendall has transformed over the years. 

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