The Transformation Of Heidi Montag From 1 To 33 Years Old
Heidi Montag burst onto the scene in 2006 in the MTV show "The Hills," which chronicled the lives of Heidi and her roommate Lauren Conrad, as well as their friends Audrina Patridge and Whitney Port. With the cast and the revolving door of dates and boyfriends all in their early 20s at the time, they brought the drama that kept audiences turning in for six seasons.
Lauren of course first rose to prominence in "Laguna Beach: The Real OC" when she was in high school. She met Heidi in college at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco. Heidi befriended Lauren during freshman orientation. In an interview with The New York Times in 2006, Heidi said, "Everyone in the room was kind of gothy, and we were the two blond girls in the room scared out of our minds."
They both transferred to the Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising in Los Angeles and Lauren began filming "The Hills," a spin-off of her first show. Due to their friendship, Heidi appeared on four episodes of the show's second season, and, per the New York Times, Heidi quickly became one of the show's most compelling characters thanks to her total lack of a filter.
Let's take a look at her transformation over the years from childhood to motherhood.
Colorado gave Heidi a serene childhood
Heidi Montag was born in Crested Butte, Colorado in 1986 to Darlene and Bill Montag. Her parents divorced in 1990 and her mother remarried Tim Egelhoff. She has an older sister named Holly and a younger brother named Sky. Heidi attended Crested Butte Community High School, per Sports Retriever.
Heidi's mom and stepdad ran The Timberline restaurant for 21 years. It closed in 2010, per Snowshoe Magazine.
Crested Butte seems like an idyllic place to grow up — and a far cry from the life Montag became known for in California. The town of 1,339 people is located at an elevation of roughly 8,900 feet in the Elk Mountain range of the Colorado Rocky Mountains. It is a ski town that gets 300 inches of snow a year making it ideal for cross country, Nordic, and Alpine skiing, per Snowshoe Magazine.
When Heidi graduated from high school, she knew she wanted to get out of Crested Butte so she packed her bags for college where her life would change dramatically when she met Lauren Conrad, who was already famous as a cast member of the hit MTV show "Laguna Beach: The Real OC."
Heidi Montag kickstarted her career with Lauren Conrad
Heidi Montag (pictured here in 2006) packed her bags and headed off to college at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco. As mentioned earlier, the outgoing Heidi befriended the more introverted Lauren Conrad during freshman orientation. Montag ran up to Conrad and said, "Will you please talk to me," per The New York Times.
By the following year, Heidi and Lauren had transferred to the Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising in Los Angeles, rented a luxury apartment together, and quickly became inseparable BFFs.
Heidi quickly lost her interest in school and dropped out to take a job as a junior assistant to a party planner, per The New York Times. She also enrolled in acting classes in the hope that the fame "The Hills" brought her would translate into an acting career. Montag did go on to appear in 2011's "Just Go With It," 2020's "Assassins 33 A.D.," and 2021's "Black Easter," as well as several reality shows, per IMDB. Heidi also appeared as herself in an episode of "How I Met Your Mother" in 2008.
Spencer Pratt comes between Heidi and Lauren in 2007
The friendship was not meant to last, however. 14 years later, and we still feel the tension between Lauren Conrad and Heidi Montag in 2007. On April 5, 2007, PerezHilton.com published an article that would lead to the end of Heidi and Lauren's friendship. Basically, someone started a rumor that Lauren and Jason Wahler had made a sex tape, per E!
Lauren took to her website immediately to deny that she and Jason had made a sex tape. She also pointed out that one of her closest friends hadn't reached out to her in the wake of the story breaking. The story also said that Lauren tried to break into Wahler's house to steal back the video and said she was on Adderal, per US Weekly (via Gawker).
The close friend who failed to reach out was Heidi, of course. Rather than responding directly to Lauren, Heidi gave a statement to a magazine that she didn't reach out because she was in the hospital (more on that in the next slide), but the real reason was because Spencer Pratt had started all the drama, per E! This leads to the most famous line uttered on television in the late '00s: "You know what you did!"
Lauren yelled the infamous line at Heidi during the first episode of season 3 of "The Hills" which aired in August 2007. Heidi and Lauren were no longer BFFs — in fact, they were now enemies. So why was Heidi in the hospital?
Heidi became obsessed with cosmetic surgery
Heidi Montag (pictured here in 2010) didn't reach out to Lauren Conrad in the wake of the sex tape allegations because she was in the hospital recovering from boob and nose jobs. When Heidi got to Los Angeles she was overcome with how "perfect" everyone looked and soon set out on a mission to sculpt herself into ... something different than she was. "Everyone had the biggest boobs! I was flat and insecure," she told People in 2010. Her insecurity got worse once she was cast on "The Hills."
It all started with a breast augmentation in 2007 — the reason she allegedly couldn't call Lauren. Heidi had at least 10 additional cosmetic surgeries after her boob and nose job, per People, including, a breast augmentation revision, liposuction on her waist, hips, inner and outer thighs; fat injections in cheeks, lips, and nasolabial folds, nose job revision, chin reduction, neck liposuction, butt augmentation, ears pinned back, mini brow lift, and botox in her forehead and frown area. As she said, "I am absolutely beyond obsessed."
Oh and by the way, Heidi underwent all 10 of those procedures in one day, per People. Why did she do it? "To feel perfect," she told the magazine.
Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt are parents
Heidi Montag met Spencer Pratt in 2007 while filming "The Hills." At the time, she was 19 and he was a 22-year-old producer. They met in a nightclub and got married in Mexico in 2008, but that ceremony wasn't legal, so they re-did the wedding in April 2009 at the Westminster Presbyterian Church in Pasadena, per The Mirror.
At the time, no one thought Heidi and Spencer would still be together in 2021 — we all remember when Heidi filed for separation from Spencer and he resorted to his old playbook of threatening to leak a sex tape. They got back together, of course, and that led to the 2009 wedding ceremony dubbed a renewal of their year-old vibes. It turns out, they were playing the public and it was all a publicity stunt.
Why did they do it? Because they ran through all their money and Spencer believed the world was going to end in 2012 and convinced Heidi to go along with it. Of course, it didn't. They ended up going on to star in a number of reality shows, including "I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out of Here" and "The Hills: New Beginnings," per IMDB.
Today, Heidi and Spencer are parents to a toddler son named Gunner (pictured here in 2019) that she features prominently on her Instagram. Based on the account, Heidi seems pretty invested in her life as a mom. As for Spencer? Well, he's selling crystals and geodes at Pratt Daddy Crystals in Los Angeles.