The actor and the Top Chef host are taking their romance slowly
Richard Gere and Padma Lakshmi are dating, PEOPLE has confirmed.
A source close to the Top Chef host says the pair are taking things slowly.
“They’re just getting to know each other,” the source said. “They’re just dating. This is the first person she’s dated since Teddy [Forstmann] passed away and she’s just putting a toe in the water of the dating world again. They’re not sure where it’s going yet.”
Lakshmi dated billionaire businessman Forstmann off and on for several years before he died of brain cancer in 2011. She was also married to award-winning novelist Salman Rushdie for three years until they divorced in 2007.
Gere split from wife Carey Lowell last year after 11 years of marriage. They are parents to son Homer, born in 2000.
Lakshmi also has a child, 3-year-old daughter Krishna Thea Lakshmi-Dell, with Adam Dell, a venture capitalist and brother to Michael Dell, the founder of the Dell computer company.
The New York Post‘s Page Six was the first to report the news that Gere and Lakshmi are dating.
• With reporting by CHARLOTTE TRIGGS