Sophie Dahl began her career as an international fashion model, working with photographers such as Richard Avedon, Herb Ritts, Steven Meisel, Bruce Weber, Peter Lindbergh and Mario Testino, and shooting campaigns for the likes of Versace, Alexander McQueen, and Yves Saint Laurent. It was writing though that was always her first love, and In 2003 she wrote an illustrated novella called "The Man With The Dancing Eyes," which was a Times bestselling book. This was followed by a novel, "Playing With The Grownups", published by Bloomsbury in 2007. Dahl has written extensively for British Vogue, and in 2010, she won a Jasmine award for her regular Vogue column about scent. She has also written for, amongst others, US Vogue, Harpers Bazaar, The Observer, The Guardian, and The Saturday Times.

A devoted eater and home cook, she wrote a book which chronicled her misadventures with food, "Miss Dahl's Voluptuous Delights", published by Harper Collins in 2009, which was her second Times bestseller. Following on from the success of Voluptuous Delights, Dahl wrote and presented a one off BBC2 six part cooking series, "The Delicious Miss Dahl" which was sold to numerous countries all over the world. In the autumn of 2011 she wrote and presented a BBC2 documentary about the Victorian domestic advisor, Isabella Beeton, shortly after her second food book, "From Season To Season" was published by Harper Collins.

Dahl lives with her husband and two young daughters in England. In 2013 she collaborated on a summer capsule collection for the British brand Brora, which she also modelled, She is currently working on a historical novel, and is a contributing editor at Harper's Bazaar.