All About Elon Musk’s Mother Maye Musk

The model and nutritionist has a close relationship with her billionaire son

Photo: Pascal Le Segretain/Getty

Maye Musk might be the mother of Elon Musk, but she’s known for a lot more than just having raised the Tesla founder.

Maye is a model, recognized widely as a silver-haired beauty who found a new level of success in her later career, both as one of the oldest women to appear on the cover of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue and as an advocate against ageism. She is also a nutritionist and dietician who has published books about healthy eating habits, including her 2021 memoir A Woman Makes a Plan: Advice for a Lifetime of Adventure, Beauty, and Success.

“She is seriously a top model right now,” model Christie Brinkley said of Maye in 2018. “She’s out there with her shock of gray-white hair, just looking gorgeous and striking everywhere she goes. People are really happy to see that.”

Having raised Elon and his two siblings in South Africa and Canada, Maye has remained a staunch supporter of her son throughout his high-profile career, who she says she “knew” was a genius when he was as young as 3. The two are close and have attended high-profile events together, including the Met Gala and Heidi Klum‘s 2022 Halloween party.

But who is Maye Musk? Here’s everything to know about her modeling career, her advocacy against ageism and her perspective on raising a billionaire entrepreneur.

She’s been modeling since she was 15

Maye Musk Instagram

Maye was born in Canada on April 19, 1948, but moved to South Africa as a baby. According to Vanity Fair, she started modeling at 15 and was a finalist in the 1969 Miss South Africa contest.

Maye has shared throwback photos from her modeling career on Instagram, even posting snaps of 1970s photo shoots in December 2022. “Modeling coats since the 1970s,” she wrote. “A few examples.”

In her 50s, she told the Daily Mail, she ditched the blonde dye she had been using to cover her roots and embraced her natural gray hair. “It’s much richer and healthier this way. I wish I’d done it earlier,” Maye told the outlet in 2017. “Looking back, letting my hair go natural was an amazing decision because I started getting major ad campaigns. I also signed with agencies in Europe and traveled to many different cities, which I loved. People would stop me in the street and say they loved my hair!”

She appeared on the cover of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue at 74

At 74 years old, Maye posed for the cover of Sports Illustrated’s 2022 Swimsuit Issue.

“If I thought I could be a swimsuit model for Sports Illustrated, people would have locked me away as a crazy lady,” she laughed in a video for SI. “I’m very excited to let people know that women in their 70s are gorgeous.”

She was one of four cover models for the issue, which also included Ciara, Kim Kardashian and Yumi Nu. “My first reaction was, I could never dream up something like that because why would anyone have a 74-year-old on their cover, especially in a swimsuit,” Musk told PEOPLE. “I do think it’s going to make women feel more comfortable in their seventies when they swim, as well as women in their twenties and thirties.”

She has three children

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Maye shares three children with her ex-husband Errol Musk: sons Elon and Kimbal and daughter Tosca. They were all born and raised in Pretoria, South Africa.

In Maye’s Swimsuit Issue cover story, her daughter Tosca wrote about how her mother inspires her. “My whole life, I’ve seen my mom do everything. As a result I think I’ll always expect her to be able to do everything,” she said. “Sometimes I wonder whether it’s time I start limiting those expectations, as she gets older. But then I look at her again, still unstoppable, and I think, not yet.”

She divorced Errol Musk in 1979 and alleged he was abusive

Maye married Erroll in 1970, though the two divorced nine years later. Both Maye and Elon have spoken negatively of Errol in the past, and Maye has alleged he was abusive during their relationship. “Everybody I knew called him ‘the Pig’ because he treated me so badly in public. And I was too scared to tell anyone,” she told Harper’s Bazaar in 2019. “Like every abused woman, I was embarrassed, and I knew I had made a mistake, you know? … He told me over and over that I was stupid, ugly, boring.”

She continued: “He was very rich, but he made sure I had nothing. Once the kids were living with me, they visited their father some weekends. He would throw out everything they arrived with, so I had to buy them all new clothes and school things. Then he’d sue me and say that I was unfit to parent.”

After their divorce, Maye moved with her kids back to Canada. “For a long time after I left my marriage, I had a pain in my gut. I was so terrified about not being able to feed my kids,” Maye said in 2022.

In a June 2022 YouTube video, Errol denied being physically or emotionally abusive to his ex-wife.

She’s a registered dietician and nutritionist

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Maye became a well-respected dietician and nutritionist after earning degrees in those subjects and publishing books about how to promote health through food. She has credited her education for helping her stay fit.

“I follow science and common sense,” she told PEOPLE. “Science says you should eat a variety of foods and eat more fruits and vegetables — I do that.”

She’s not scared of aging — and advocates against female ageism

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The nutritionist and model has been an advocate for age representation in the fashion industry ever since she booked her first New York Fashion Week show in 2016 in her 60s. After walking in the Christian Siriano show three years later, she spoke to PEOPLE about other top brands that didn’t feature models her age. “I don’t think they’ve had older models in their shows,” she said. “That has to change!”

Though she believes there should be more opportunities for older models, she said that she felt welcome in the industry. “They are treating me very nicely and they are very happy that I’m modeling at this age,” she added. “When I go to shoots, the young models are excited to see me. It proves they can have long and successful careers, too.”

Maye has been open about her perspective on aging, telling CBS This Morning in 2021, “As I got into my 60s, people were talking about aging and being scared of aging, and I’m saying, ‘Why are you scared of aging?’ For example, when you turn 50, women are scared of losing their jobs. But then men become CEOs and presidents, so what’s that about?”

She continued, “We need to change that around. And if somebody’s making you feel bad about your age, just say goodbye. You don’t need that person in your life.”

She’s CoverGirl’s oldest spokesmodel

Mike Coppola/Getty

Maye appeared in her first campaign for CoverGirl cosmetics in 2018. “It’s the most exciting job, or it’s not even a job,” she said. “It’s the most exciting time of my life to be a Covergirl at the age of 70 where I’ve given up dreaming of it since I was 18.”

She was in one of Beyoncé’s music videos

Maye appeared as a cloaked lady holding a hairless cat in Beyoncé‘s “Haunted” music video from the 2013 surprise visual album Beyoncé. The video features a glamorous, Old Hollywood-style Beyoncé arriving at a mansion full of scary, sexy characters.

In 2013, Maye tweeted a photo from the shoot and wrote, “Pic from @beyonce video Haunted. Amazing team.”