Shayk was born in Yemanzhelinsk, Russia to Volga Tatar Valery Shaykhlislamov, a coal miner, and his Russian wife Olga, a kindergarten music teacher.She has said that she inherited her looks from her father and that people often think she is South American: "My father was dark skinned, because he was Tatar, sometimes Tatars can look Brazilian... I get my light eyes from my mother."She has one sibling, a sister named Tatiana
