On a September morning, 29-year-old Jennifer Gates Nassar arrives at a Manhattan photo studio at 9:30 a.m.—the first one there, even before the photography crew, for a shoot scheduled later that day with her younger sister, 23-year-old Phoebe, and their mother, philanthropist Melinda French Gates. Phoebe later tells me this is typical of Jennifer: “She would always arrive early if she could.” Melinda adds that as a child, Jennifer liked to get to school just after the teachers.

“I’ve gotten better with time!” says Jenn, now a pediatric resident at Manhattan’s Mount Sinai Hospital. As the oldest child, she was the type who made PowerPoint presentations to persuade her parents the family needed a dog. Along with Phoebe and their middle sibling, brother Rory—now an analyst in Washington, DC, who generally keeps a low profile—the Gates kids grew up outside Seattle in what sometimes seemed like a normal family, despite their father, Bill Gates, running the world’s largest software company. Jenn often acted as a second mother, while Phoebe would track mud inside, leave the house with messy hair, and tell small fibs about her curfew just to annoy her. “I was obsessed with her,” Phoebe says of her big sister.

The family attracted a lot of attention, and Melinda carefully considered how to shield her children from it. By the time she married Bill in 1994, he was already famous as the founder of Microsoft, where she had worked since 1987—the only woman in her hiring class. She sometimes took trips ahead of him, like quick vacations to Hawaii with Jenn before the other children were born. When he joined them a few days later, “the difference in how we were treated was just night and day,” Melinda recalls.

To manage the spotlight, the family established certain rules. The girls used Melinda’s maiden name until middle school, Bill wasn’t allowed to drop them off during the first few weeks of a new school year, and the TV was turned off quickly if he appeared on the news. Once, a preschool teacher pulled Melinda aside and gently suggested she explain to Jenn who her father was, as classmates were starting to figure it out on their own. “I had been around a lot of kids from wealthy families in college,” says Melinda, who was raised in Dallas by an aerospace engineer father and a homemaker mother, “and I knew how I did not want my children to turn out. I really thought about some of the middle-class values I grew up with.”

According to Forbes, Bill Gates’s current wealth is around $105 billion, and Melinda’s is about $29 billion. The family home outside Seattle, where the children grew up, is reportedly 66,000 square feet—nicknamed Xanadu 2.0 by the press—and features a trampoline room, six kitchens, 24 bathrooms, and a library housing a Leonardo da Vinci manuscript. Despite this immense wealth, the Gateses have become models of a traditional, Andrew Carnegie-style approach to philanthropy, committed to giving back their fortune to society. Earlier this year, Bill announced he would accelerate his pledge to give away nearly all his wealth by 2045, writing, “People will say a lot of things about me when I die, but I am determined that ‘he died rich’ will not be one of them.” Melinda has long expressed similar principles, often quoting, “To whom much is given, much is expected.” Jenn shares, “My mom had a less poetic version of that quote. She’d say, ‘We’re not people who sit around and eat bonbons.’ What she meant was, if you’re lucky enough to have a lot, you can choose to do nothing or you can choose to make a contribution.”

Sitting with this trio, so quick to tease and eager to entertain each other, it’s clear that something went right in their upbringing—that the effort paid off.The effort their parents made to maintain composure and stability in public life had repercussions at home. After the overturning of Roe in 2022, Phoebe—now cofounder of the fashion shopping app Phia, a blend of her name and that of her cofounder and former college roommate, Sophia Kianni, and cohost of the podcast The Burnouts with Kianni—became particularly engaged with reproductive rights. “We know that when a woman has choice, it’s the most scalable form of philanthropy,” she explains. “Give a woman access to birth control and abortion, and she can achieve anything in her life.” After discussions with her mother, Phoebe organized a trip to Louisiana and Mississippi, states with near-total abortion bans, to witness the impact on women’s health firsthand. “You can’t believe you’re in the U.S.,” she recalls. “I spoke with people who accompany women into clinics while protesters outside are throwing things.” Before last year’s election, she collaborated with her friend Karlie Kloss on a video documentary series about the effects of tightening reproductive rights, with another installment planned for 2026. “Phoebe brings incredible energy that galvanizes everyone around her,” Kloss remarks. “She’s brilliant, always asking the right questions.”

Melinda Gates and her daughter Jenn also visited Louisiana this year, using the last days of Jenn’s maternity leave. “Our goal was to learn directly from legislators, providers, and patients,” Jenn shares. They met women seeking basic care, mothers who had lost children, providers serving Medicare-dependent patients, and medical school educators. “This is all part of the belief,” Melinda adds thoughtfully, “that women deserve much better access to healthcare.”

Just days before our meeting, Melinda announced a $100 million investment through Pivotal, her philanthropic initiative launched in 2015, and the global health nonprofit Wellcome Leap. The funding will support research into diseases that disproportionately affect women, such as autoimmune disorders, which impact women 80% of the time. In another recent effort, Melinda and her daughters are founding donors of the Women’s Health Co-Lab, managed by Iconiq Impact, the philanthropy arm of investment firm Iconiq. Initially, $70 million will be distributed to organizations focused on maternal health, sexual and reproductive health, and gender-based violence, with a total goal of $100 million. Matti Navellou, head of Iconiq Impact, notes that conversations with Phoebe were crucial in launching the project. “We’re not only regressing in some areas of women’s health and rights, but funding is scarce,” Navellou says. “Having a recognized name like the Gates family helps bring people off the sidelines—it makes a huge difference.”

Reflecting on parenting, Melinda shares, “I really thought about the middle-class values I grew up with. I knew how I did not want my children to turn out.”

Spending time with these women underscores that parenting is a profound equalizer, regardless of resources or background—whether donating millions or fundraising for the PTA. In her memoir, The Next Day: Transitions, Change, and Moving Forward, Melinda writes about leaving a Seattle hospital with newborn Jenn and experiencing an earthquake in their first days at home. “I realized I would have died for her that night,” she writes. “Here was undeniable evidence that, at that moment, nothing else mattered.”At the center of my chest, pounding with the beat of my heart, was a new and powerful force: a fierce, almost primal maternal love that felt overwhelming.

Melinda is both a reader and a writer, according to her book editor, Will Schwalbe. When they met for sandwiches and iced tea in the modest downstairs restaurant of her publisher’s building in New York, he asked what she was reading. He recalls her pulling two books from her bag: The Book of Awakening by Mark Nepo and a novel by Ann Patchett.

For Melinda, becoming a parent meant stepping back from her career at Microsoft. She wanted to be as present for her children as her own mother had been for her, as she writes in her memoir. Even as her work with what was then the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (launched in 2000) began to demand more of her attention, she set boundaries. For example, she avoided work calls when her kids were in the car—a rule she followed until one day, while driving Phoebe and Rory across town to pick up a second puppy, she had to take an urgent call about personnel management. Overhearing that conversation was an eye-opener for Phoebe, who says, “I remember you talking about building the right team and finding the right people. Even though I was young, I absorbed those lessons.” Phoebe’s startup, Phia, has since raised $8 million in seed funding from investors including Hailey Bieber, Kris Jenner, and Sheryl Sandberg. Jenn adds, “I’m so grateful to have had a mom who was out in the world doing good and working. I hope my own daughters see that I’m working and enjoying what I do outside of being their mom.”

Both Jenn and Phoebe attended Stanford and have now settled in New York, where they’ve “created our own little ecosystem,” says Jenn, who is married to professional equestrian Nayel Nassar. For Phoebe, New York is also ideal for her career: “I doubt I’ll ever leave,” she says. Melinda travels back and forth from Seattle to visit. “And if you write that she lives in New York, she might have to move here,” Jenn jokes, lightly acknowledging that, despite their efforts to maintain privacy, there will always be public curiosity about the Gates family.

Living and working in the same city has brought the daughters closer than ever. And being a grandmother has brought Melinda back to the joyful early days of parenting, but without the perfectionism she once held herself to. “When we’re with the granddaughters, we’re just on the floor. We’re literally on the floor,” she says. Phoebe adds, “When I see her with Jenn’s daughters, she’s willing to embrace play and chaos.”

Before the interview, I expected that Melinda and her daughters would not want to discuss her 2021 divorce from Bill. But I wanted to ask about a part of her memoir where she describes how hard it was to tell her parents about the split. “I didn’t really care what the news coverage would be like or what the headlines would say, but the thought of telling my very Catholic parents was horrible,” she writes. I asked Melinda if there was a time when her daughters had to tell her something difficult.

She pauses, asks for a moment to think, and returns to the question a few minutes later. “There were some hard years,” she says, “between work or what was going on personally in my life—they would say, ‘Mom, you seem really anxious.’ Sometimes we’re anxious and don’t see it in ourselves, but when someone you love points it out, you realize, ‘Oh, I need to look at this.'”

Phoebe interjects, “I was going to say something different. For some reason, you always used to wear long sleeves and were so insecure about showing your legs or your arms. I told you, ‘Mom, this is actually a negative for me. You look—””That’s amazing,” Melinda laughs. “You’re right, you did tell me that.”

Phoebe adds, “You used to wear those awful skorts. I remember saying, ‘Take that skort off!'”

“You see, I get plenty of honesty from them,” Melinda remarks.

The three women share a bond of trust that allows them to speak openly—whether it’s about skorts and parenting or the challenges holding women back and the focus required to avoid further setbacks. Looking ahead, Phoebe is dedicated to her start-up, while Jenn is immersed in her residency, ensuring her patients receive her undivided attention, much like Melinda gives to her grandchildren. There’s always work to be done, and you never know where it might start.

Styling credits: For Melinda, hair by Reece Walker and makeup by Kindra Mann. For Phoebe and Jennifer, hair by Blake Erik, makeup by Dmitry Kukushkin, manicures by Eri Handa, and tailoring by Carol Ai for Carol Ai Studio.

Produced by Modem Creative Projects.

Frequently Asked Questions
Of course Here is a list of FAQs about Melinda French Gates and her daughters Jennifer and Phoebe regarding their first joint interview

General Beginner Questions

1 Who are Melinda French Gates Jennifer and Phoebe Gates
Melinda French Gates is a philanthropist businesswoman and cofounder of the Bill Melinda Gates Foundation Jennifer and Phoebe are her two daughters with Bill Gates

2 When and where did their first joint interview take place
The interview took place in early 2023 and was published by The Today Show

3 Why was this interview such a big deal
It was the first time the three of them sat down together publicly to discuss their family their relationship and their individual work offering a rare personal glimpse into their lives

4 What was the main topic of the conversation
They primarily discussed their motherdaughter bond their shared values and how Melinda has influenced her daughters paths in philanthropy and public health

Deeper Advanced Questions

5 What did we learn about their family dynamics from the interview
We learned that they are a very closeknit family who values open communication Melinda described her parenting style as focused on raising independent empowered women

6 How are Jennifer and Phoebe following in their mothers footsteps
Both daughters are actively involved in philanthropy and social causes Jennifer is a public health advocate and medical student while Phoebe has been involved in gender equity and social justice work often keeping a lower public profile

7 Did they address the divorce of Bill and Melinda Gates
They did not delve into specific details about the divorce The interview focused on the positive presentday relationship between Melinda and her daughters and their shared mission

8 What unique perspectives did Jennifer and Phoebe bring to the conversation
They provided a view of what its like to grow up with a globally influential mother discussing both the privileges and the pressures and how they are carving out their own identities

9 What was a key piece of advice Melinda shared about parenting
A key theme was teaching her daughters to use their voices and platforms for good emphasizing that your voice is your power and encouraging them to stand up for their beliefs

10 How does this interview reflect the evolution of the Gates familys public persona
It