[3] At age 18, she was awarded France's highest honours as both a singer and an actress with the Prix Romy Schneider[4] and the César Award for Most Promising Actress[5][6][7][8][9] for Jean-Claude Brisseau's Noce Blanche, as well as the Victoires de la Musique[10][11][12] for Best Female Singer for her album Variations sur le même t'aime.

[13] Her most notable films also include Élisa (1995) alongside Gérard Depardieu,[14] Witch Way Love (1997) opposite Jean Reno,[15] Une chance sur deux (1998) co-starring with Jean-Paul Belmondo and Alain Delon,[16] Girl on the Bridge (1999),[17] Heartbreaker (2010)[18] and Café de Flore (2011).

[19] Her tribute to Jeanne Moreau at the 1995 Cannes Film Festival during which they sang in duet "Le Tourbillon" became notable in French popular culture.

[24] She has been a muse to numerous musicians and lyricists who each took one of her albums under their aegis, including Étienne Roda-Gil (1988), Serge Gainsbourg (1990), Lenny Kravitz (1992), Matthieu Chedid (2007), Benjamin Biolay (2013), Samuel Benchetrit and The Bees (2018).

[25][26] As a model, Paradis has appeared on more than 300 magazine covers worldwide including Vogue, Elle, Harper's Bazaar, Madame Figaro, Paris Match, Vanity Fair, Glamour, Premiere, and Marie Claire.

At the age of seven, Paradis appeared on the local television program L'École des fans, a talent show for child singers.

[32] Paradis recorded her first single, "La Magie des surprises-parties", in 1983 and performed it in an Italian festival in 1985.

Although not a hit, it paved the way for the song with which she became internationally famous, "Joe le taxi," composed by Franck Langolff in 1987, when she was 14.

Paradis released the album Variations sur le même t'aime in 1990, containing a remake of the Lou Reed song "Walk on the Wild Side".

The album was written by French composer Serge Gainsbourg, whom she met when she received the best singer award at Victoires de la Musique, on 4 February 1990.

Written and produced by Kravitz, the album, titled Vanessa Paradis, topped the French chart and briefly made the UK listings (number 45).

In 1997, Paradis played in Un amour de sorcière with Jeanne Moreau and Jean Reno, before filming Une chance sur deux, with Alain Delon and Jean-Paul Belmondo.

Paradis won two Les Victoires de la Musique awards for this album in February 2008.

[40] Paradis released an acoustic album in November 2010 entitled Une nuit à Versailles.

[54] In May 2014, at a Chanel show in Dubai, Vanessa Paradis confirmed her relationship with French singer Benjamin Biolay.