The Culpo sisters have always loved putting on shows together. “We would put on synchronized dance routines,” Olivia Culpo tells POPSUGAR, recalling her and her sisters’ childhood love of showmanship. “Aurora was always in the middle.”
Aurora, the oldest, was “the boss and the scariest, and everything she said went. She was definitely the ringleader,” Olivia, now 31, remembers. “Sophie was the baby and just really cute and charming, and I was just stupid me.”
Culpo, most well-known for being a model, is taking a walk down memory lane in a karaoke room in a swanky club at Las Vegas’s JBL Fest. She’s sitting shoulder to shoulder with her sisters, who are all matching in chic black ensembles. They also speak in sync, almost as if there’s a little bit of telepathy flowing between them. “There was always a little competition in the limelight,” Sophia, now 26, agrees, echoing her big sister.
These days, competition with each other is no longer something they’re trying to cultivate. The first season of the sisters’ reality TV show premiered in 2022, and their bond is at the core of that narrative. “As adults, we care about each other so much,” Olivia says, adding that none of that youthful competition has made it into their present reality. “This world is so ruthless and so hard and so painful. You don’t want to see anybody you love hurt, so a win for one of us is truly a win for all of us. When something bad happens to one of us -“
“We all suffer,” Sophia responds. “This one will fight every troll in the comments on a sister’s post,” she says, motioning to 34-year-old Aurora. Aurora agrees, noting that the sisters work hard to keep each other grounded amid the madness of Hollywood and the chaos of life itself.
It’s a busy time for them – Olivia is deep in wedding planning, and Aurora has a 2-year-old and a 4-year-old – but the sisters are sure to let one another know when they’re getting too carried away.
“This world is so ruthless and so hard and so painful. You don’t want to see anybody you love hurt, so a win for one of us is truly a win for all of us.”
“We’ve gone through phases of checking each other,” Aurora says, explaining that the sisters watch out for when one of them starts “wanting to look a certain way or sound a certain way.” The sisters know that “each of us are kind of extensions of each other,” she says. That can sometimes lead to them attempting to control the others’ behavior. But now, for the most part, she adds, “we know what not to say or do, in order to be respectful.”
Still, they’re always keeping an eye out for each other. “We just remind each other to be gentle with ourselves and to stay grounded,” Olivia says. “It’s really hard [not] to believe negative thoughts about yourself, so you need reminders sometimes. I feel like we are always that for each other.”
When something goes wrong in one of their lives, the other two snap into action. Sometimes, they’ll remind each other to read certain books, like Marianne Williamson’s “A Return to Love,” which Aurora calls their collective “breakup book.” “Untethered Soul” by Michael Singer is another one of her picks, while Sophia often reaches for “What Happy People Know” by Dan Baker.
Aurora also readily admits that the sisters are “kind of woo-woo at heart.” “We’re spiritual, so we believe in God’s will over our will, however you believe in God,” she says, speaking for all of them. They also “have a couple psychics basically on retainer,” she adds, and it’s easy to imagine the three of them lined up like the three fates – except this time waiting to have their own fortunes told. They also often consult tarot card readers, and Olivia and Aurora are both transcendental meditation devotees. And though Sophie is the newest to the spiritual world, according to Aurora, she’s begun a journaling practice, and her sisters are holding her to it. “We’ll remind her to journal,” Aurora laughs. Sophia agrees, adding that she’s also begun pinning scraps of poetry to her mirror, which makes it easy for her sisters to tell when she’s going through it.
A lot of the trio’s love for wellness and positive thinking comes from their upbringing. When asked about her favorite bit of wellness advice, Aurora references something her mom tells them often: “‘Go where the warmth is.’ I think we’ve all said it to each other at one point,” she says. “It kind of means, like, just go and follow the feelings that feel good and the people that feel good. It’s just kind of a surrender.”
Olivia also cites their mother when it comes to formative life advice. “‘Work hard and be a good person.’ That’s another one from our mom,” she says. “It just reminds you that there are things outside of your control. You can’t control what other people are going to conceptualize about you. What you can do is, you can know you’re a good person. You can work hard and be a good person. If you do that, everything will be great in your life,” she laughs.
They have a lot of advice to offer each other, as it turns out – more than enough to fill the pages of a self-help book, which Olivia agrees they “should write.” In general, Aurora says, the siblings often tell each other to do less – a worthwhile reminder that a lot of the small stuff we spend our lives sweating isn’t all that significant.
Having their own show has meant that not everything can be love and light, of course. Filming has forced the siblings to confront stuff that “normally we’d just shove under the rug,” Aurora says – referencing shadow work, an aspect of any spiritual journey that the sisters have come across in their own spiritual exploits.
Still, the sisters’ goal is really the same as it was when they were little kids, performing dances in their living room. Only now, they’re a much more united front, and the audience is the world and its infinite screens instead of their mother.
“We’re not exactly sure where that will take us,” Aurora says, “but we’ll keep sharing as much of ourselves as possible.”
