Personal life
Iman Mohamed is a Muslim. She has credited her faith with helping her through dark times. She is fluent in five languages: Somali, Arabic, Italian, French, and English. She also obtained American citizenship when she was in her twenties.
Iman was first married at age 18 to Hassan, a young Somali entrepreneur and Hilton hotel executive. The marriage ended a few years later when she moved to the US to pursue a modeling career. In 1977, Iman dated the American actor Warren Beatty. Later that year, she became engaged to the American basketball player Spencer Haywood, and they married soon after. Their daughter, from whom she has a granddaughter, was born in 1978. The couple divorced in February 1987.
In 1990, Iman met the English musician David Bowie on a surprise blind date set up by a friend in Los Angeles. The friend was hairdresser Teddy Antolin, who invited Iman to a party. When she arrived at the restaurant, there were only four attendees: Antolin, Antolin's boyfriend, Iman, and Bowie. At the end of the evening, Bowie offered to drive her home, and she said: "No, I'm going to drive my car." He invited her to tea the next day and Iman learned he did not drink tea. They went to a nearby coffee shop. Bowie named his 1991 instrumental piece "Abdulmajid" after her, which was later converted into a symphony by Philip Glass.
On 24 April 1992, Iman married Bowie in a private ceremony in Lausanne, Switzerland. The wedding was solemnized in Florence, Italy, on 6 June. Their daughter, Alexandria Zahra Jones, was born 15 August 2000 at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City. Iman is also stepmother to Bowie's son from a previous marriage, Duncan Jones. Both children bear Bowie's legal surname. Iman and her family resided primarily in Manhattan and London. When Bowie died on 10 January 2016, she wrote in tribute to him that "the struggle is real, but so is God". She refuses to refer him as her "late" husband, stating in 2022 that "he is my husband".
