Born on December 17, 1970, to the Honourable Toby Tennant and Lady Emma Cavendish, daughter of the current Duke of Devonshire, Stella was reared in a life of privilege. She attended the prestigious St. Leonards School for girls in Scotland before going to Marlborough College in Wiltshire, England. An art foundation course at Kingston Polytechnic preceded a degree course at Winchester School of Art, where Stella embarked upon her sculpting career—until fate stepped in.

Once while still in school, Stella accompanied an editor friend to a fashion shoot with Steven Miesel, who was in London looking for non-models for a British Vogue story. The willowy art student with a septum ring stepped onto the set and, after refusing to remove the metalwork, was shot by the legendary image maker. The rest is history.

The next day, Stella was flown to Paris for a Vogue Italia photo shoot and within weeks was walking the best shows in fashion capitals across Europe. Stella, with her choppy-haired androgynous aesthetic, embodied the edginess popular in the early '90s. She became the face of Versace and an editorial superstar, appearing on countless covers and in numerous spreads in glossies like L’Officiel, Numéro, W, Harper's Bazaar, and various international editions of Vogue. In 1996 she signed an exclusive contract with Chanel after becoming a muse for Karl Lagerfeld, who praised Stella for her "modern allure."

Despite all of her success, Stella remained grounded and managed to find time for family and personal endeavors. In 1998 she announced her retirement from modeling and married French photographer David Lasnet in her native Scotland a year later. The couple, who once split time between homes in New York and London, purchased a sprawling Scottish estate where they've committed to raising their family of four children—Marcel, Cecily, Jasmine, and Iris.

Stella still maintains a presence in the fashion industry, though now can afford to be selective in her choice of work. In recent years she has been featured in ads for Burberry, Givenchy, Louis Vuitton, and Marc Jacobs and has walked runway shows for Aquascutum and Julien Macdonald.