[6] As she said in a Teen Vogue interview, she ended up being scouted herself: I had come straight from my auntie and uncle's farm, and I was wearing this big gray barn jacket with mud all over it.

[6][9]Ward did not win the competition, but her fragile, unique look, got the attention of a spotter from Vivien's Model Agency who saw her potential and made a show reel.

[6][7] The show reel then landed on the desk of ace model scout David Cunningham from the New York City agency IMG.

[8] Her look inspired a new generation of baby doll-like models such as Vlada Roslyakova, Heather Marks, Lily Cole, Caroline Trentini, Britni Stanwood, Lisa Cant.

[9] In September 2004, at only sixteen, Ward became the youngest model to appear on the cover of American Vogue photographed by Steven Meisel as one of the nine "Models of the Moment" with Daria Werbowy, Natalia Vodianova, Gisele Bündchen, Isabeli Fontana, Karolina Kurkova, Liya Kebede, Hana Soukupova and Karen Elson.

[12] In February 2005, Ward appeared in no less than 20 New York runways for designers that included Vera Wang, Oscar de la Renta and Calvin Klein, and was rumored to earn about $20,000 per show.

[13] And at 17, she became the famous face of Calvin Klein's Obsession Night perfume billboards – bumping Kate Moss out of a job in the process.

[8][13] Ward was reportedly paid $1.3 million for the Calvin Klein campaign and counted similar deals with Burberry and Valentino among her model earnings.

[8][13] In September 2005, Ward secured a coveted place on the inaugural cover of Vogue China posing between Chinese models Du Juan and Wang Wenqin and was shot by leading photographer Patrick Demarchelier.

In July, earning at an estimated total of $3 million in the past 12 months, Forbes ranked her tenth on the list of the World's 15 Top-Earning Supermodels.

[19] In October 2007 Ward appeared on the cover of the very first issue of Vogue India, centred between Bollywood actresses Bipasha Basu and Priyanka Chopra shot by photographer Patrick Demarchelier (who also photographed her in Vogue China) and it became the second time Ward has appeared on an inaugural issue.

While I am taking some time off currently to rest and enjoy the company of friends and family, I am still very much a (excited and enthusiastic) working model and actress.

Her final modeling job before her hiatus was an appearance on the cover of and inside the October 2008 issue of Spanish Marie Claire.

[22] Slightly over a year later, in November 2009, Ward's agent officially announced her retiring from the industry after her notable absence in the past few runway seasons.

[26] As for her career, she went on to say:In terms of me shying away from modelling, I'd like to clarify in some way that I was taking a break from many things in my life and obviously what people in the public see is that I'm pulling away from what is more 'public'.

The same month, Ward posed for the cover of Australian InStyle alongside close friends and fellow models Jessica Gomes and Nicole Trunfio.

She starred alongside Toni Collette and Rhys Wakefield in Australian director Elissa Down's film The Black Balloon as the girlfriend of a boy whose brother has autism.

After three years out of the spotlight, Ward made her international stage debut on 22 March 2011 for the Perth Theatre Company's production of The Ugly One.

[42] In the summer of 2011, Ward played Tamara, an antagonistic mermaid, in Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, opposite Johnny Depp.