You know the popular myth that we all have a twin out there somewhere; well one woman went to great lengths to find her doppelganger double.
Irish TV presenter Niamh Geaney, who launched a 28-day challenge called Twin Strangers to see her closest living lookalike, was left amazed when she discovered a woman who is her spitting image living just one hour away.
Niamh, 26, found Karen Branigan in April this year when her social media campaign went viral and when the pair met and had a photo-shoot together the results were shockingly similar.
While documenting her experience online Niamh said she was “ridiculously nervous” about meeting a complete stranger who looked just like her but found the whole experience amazing.
“For the duration of our encounter I pretty much stared at her,” said Niamh in an online video. “I couldn’t get over her face.”
“And some of the expressions she would pull I would think to myself or say aloud, ‘Oh my God that’s my face’. I can’t remember the number of times I said, ‘this is so freaky’. It was truly amazing.
While the pair share many physical traits do they have many personality traits in common?
“I would say Karen is the shyer of the two of us,” said Niamh.
Adding: “Then you have to remember this was an even more surreal experience for her than it was for me. I’m the weirdo that contacted Karen and asked her to meet me.”
But Niamh’s identical lookalike journey didn’t stop there. During the project she chanced upon meeting a second woman who looked more like her than the first living in Italy.
Finding two women who shared almost identical looks with her Niamh said was “absolutely crazy”.
In the past week the blue-eyed brunette has travelled to Genoa to meet her second ‘twin stranger’, Luisa, who contacted her after seeing the campaign online.
“It was a pretty big commitment, flying over to Italy. What if I don’t look like her? What does she think of me?” Geaney said, adding that she met Luisa’s friend and mum before seeing her Italian twin in-person.
The resemblance is so uncanny that in a video online Luisa’s mother told Geaney admitted that from a distance, she thought Niamh was her daughter.
“(Luisa is) more like me as a person, in movements, than Karen. Karen is a really good physical match. Luisa . . . was speaking in the same way, with her hands and expressions and the way she gets really excited about things.”
After being inundated with enthusiasm for the project, Geaney has launched TwinStrangers.com, which allows people to upload photos and describe their physical features, and then matches them to others.
Geaney says so far, matches have been made between people in Russia and Italy, Holland and the U.S., and Mexico and Brazil, among other places.
“It’s kind of like a social phenomenon. I think everyone is interested in finding their twin stranger . . . Everybody says we’re really unique and different — but how unique are we? I think people are really drawn to that,” she said.
But some people don’t need to look to the internet to find their twin – many can see physical similarities between members of their families.
See these amazing celebrities who have kids who look exactly like them.
Niamh Geaney’s (left) internet search allowed her to discover found her first ‘twin stranger’ in Karen Branigan living just one hour away in Dublin. PHOTO: Twin Strangers.
Niamh found her second doppelgänger, Lusia Guizzardi living in Genoa, Italy. PHOTO: Twin Strangers.
Reese Witherspoon and her mini-me daughter Ava, 14.
Reese Witherspoon and her mini-me daughter Ava.
Ava and Reese looking very similar in 2010.
Tina Fey’s daughter Alice is a dead ringer for her famous mum.
Julianne Moore and her daughter Liv share the same flame-coloured hair.
Arnold Schwarzenegger and his love child Joseph Baena.
John Travolta and his daughter Ella Bleu look very similar.
Yasmin and Amber Le Bon.
Uma Thurman and her daughter Maya.
Anna Nicole Smith and her daughter Dannielynn.
Billy Joel and his daughter Alexa Ray.
Will Smith and his son Jaden.
Heather Locklear with her daughter Ava Sambora.
Katie Holmes and Suri Cruise.
Kate Hudson and Goldie Hawn.
Jennifer Garner and Violet Affleck.
Jerry Hall and Georgia May Jagger.
Meryl Streep with her daughter Mamie.
Heidi Klum with her daughter Leni.
Madonna and Lourdes.
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