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Furniture line shows Cindy Crawford's homey side_ 3/27/2009

Part of Cindy Crawford's appeal, aside from her beauty, is that she acts like she's not famous.

A working wife and mother trying to balance a career and family. A devoted sibling to her sisters Danielle Skov and Chris Bohnsak.

More than anything, the former supermodel wants her sisters to be comfortable at home. She's giving them options with the Cindy Crawford Home collection, a furniture line created for the Florida-based Rooms to Go.

The line includes more than 100 pieces, from living room suites to children's furniture. Also available through other retailers, the collection grosses more than $250 million in sales annually.

Crawford, who recently visited Rooms to Go in suburban Houston, Texas, says before she committed to doing the line, she considered her sisters' needs.

"They can't go hire a decorator and buy a house full of furniture," said Crawford, 43. "So I really thought about how home fashion translates to my sisters. I want something real women can use and enjoy."

Designers from Rooms to Go visited Crawford's Malibu, Calif., home "to see what I like and how I live," she said. She approves the fabrics and styles. She says some of the pieces reflect her relaxed-traditional decorating style; others look more contemporary.

"I've always loved decorating and creating a sanctuary for myself and later for my family," Crawford said. Her travels have influenced her taste, she added. "I had an apartment in New York, a Spanish-style house in Brentwood, and now I live at the beach. So my houses have changed as I've grown up, evolved and added kids to the mix."

Crawford forfeited a scholarship to study chemical engineering to pursue her modeling career after high school.

Considered one of the world's most beautiful women, she appeared on more than 1,000 magazine covers, walked the runways for fashion legends and was one of the first fashion models to pose for Playboy.

Today, Crawford's many ventures have included a series of exercise videos, her Cindy Crawford's Basic Face book (with makeup artist Sonia Kashuk) and the Meaningful Beauty skin-care line (with Paris cosmetic surgeon Jean-Louis Sebagh).

Crawford's all-American look is punctuated by her trademark beauty mole.

She nearly had it removed when she was young, she confessed, because her sisters teased her about her "ugly mark."

But after Vogue magazine ran her photograph on its cover with the mole untouched, it became her calling card.

Elite supermodels of the 1980s such as Crawford, Linda Evangelista, Naomi Campbell and Christy Turlington were shapely and a little older than today's top models. Crawford says she wouldn't have made the cut by current standards.

"Right now, it's about being a size 0, and obviously, that's not who I am," she said. "Really, in some stores in L.A., I'm a large. ... My sisters and friends in Illinois would never be able to shop here. But fashion's goal is about fantasy. It's not realistic. Unfortunately, it makes all of us look in the mirror and feel like we're lacking."

Crawford and her husband, Rande Gerber, have two children, Presley, 9, and Kaia, 7. She now has an occasional modeling job (she recently appeared on the cover of Spanish Vogue), but spends most weeks at home.

"I'm from DeKalb, Ill. My brother died when I was young, my parents got divorced. I have brown hair and brown eyes. I'm not anorexic. I've never trashed a hotel room. I think I'm a regular woman," she said.

She's also embracing her age and new opportunities. "I didn't know enough to dream this big," she said.