Melania has always kept her Slovenian heritage close. When Barron was young, he even spoke with a Slovenian accent, and her parents left their home country to be closer to their daughter and grandchild. Sadly, last year, Melania lost her mother, but her father continues to lend support.

Although Melania has lived in the US for decades, she takes care to keep her heritage — and native language — alive. When she and Donald visited victims of the devastating LA wildfires, the First Lady was heard comforting a woman in her native language. Now, she’s being praised online.

Melania Trump’s journey to becoming First Lady of the United States for the second time is really quite astonishing. Born Melania Knauss on April 26, 1970, in Novo Mesto, Slovenia, she grew up in the small railway town of Sevnica.

Her father, Viktor, was a car mechanic and chauffeur, and her mother, Amalija, worked as a pattern-maker at a clothing factory. Amalija had a great passion for design and reportedly spent untold hours making clothes for Melania and her older sister, Ines.

“I grew up with a beautiful family and had a wonderful childhood,” Melania has previously said. “My mother and father taught us the importance of education, hard work and family.”

Melania grew up in a modest home, but her parents were a big deal in the small town of Sevnica. She studied at a special high school for industrial design and photography, but at 16, her life would change… and purely down to coincidence. While leaving a fashion show at the Festival Hall, fashion photographer Stane Jerko noticed Melania leaning on a fence.

Melania Trump – Slovenian heritage
In 1987, photographers didn’t really have the opportunity to find new faces for their work through the Internet. Instead, they sometimes chanced upon someone in real life.

“By the staircase at the entrance, I saw this girl,’ Jerko recalled. “She was tall, slim, with long hair. I told her who I was, what I did, and why I would photograph her.”

At that point, Melania wanted to study to become an architect. But this was a big opportunity. Jerko, meanwhile, thought the girl had something special.

“She was shy and reserved at first,” he explained. “Not wanting to open herself up.” But she quickly got into it and asked, ‘Why are you constantly moving the light? Is this how I should be holding myself?’”