Erica Mena Biography

Erica Mena started earning a living even before finishing her school; she could not complete her formal diploma due to difficulties at home. Experience, however, has been her biggest teacher and she has had the privilege of addressing the graduates of the Unity Centre of Urban Technology.

Erica’s career got the initial boost when she won the MTV's Jenifer Lopez Look- Alike contest. After winning the contest she was cast in her first music video, Can’t Stop-Won’t Stop, by Young Gunz.

At the age of 16 she won her second MTV contest, Say What Karaoke. From there on she became a known name in the show business. When she was a budding video vixen, Erica was featured as an innocent model being seduced by Chris Brown on his popular video for the song Yo! (Excuse Me Miss).

Another of her most notarized vixen roles was in the music video Fabulous Breath with Emily B. She featured in a number of music videos of well-known artists like Fat, Joe, Akon, and Rich Dollaz. Besides music videos during her initial years, she featured in a couple of episodes of Kourtney and Kim Take Miami. It was here that she got her first taste of reality television and realised her potential to make a name for herself. It was also here that fans got to see her feisty personality for the first time.

She was featured on the pages of MAXIM KING Magazine, The Source and XXL Magazine, to name a few. She also featured in the print media campaign for Tommy Hilfiger and endorsed many other brands, including Loreal and Roca Wear.

Erica always wanted to be a designer, so she worked with Randa Quraan of Socially Loud for some time and created HER, her own clothing line. In fact, in 2015, on the 5th season of Love and Hip Hop, she donned clothes of her own ‘Spring – Summer’ collection.

In April 2013, she released her autobiography, Underneath it All, that reveals her dark family secrets. Her second book, Chronicles of a Confirmed Bachelorette, covers her love life.

Erica was born and brought up in Bronx, New York City, by her parents and elder sister. Her parents are of Puerto Rican & Dominican decent.

Her father was a drug dealer and that became a source of problems for the family. Her mother was forced to peddle drugs due to which she was imprisoned and it was there that she gave birth to Erica. Her father abused her till her mother was released from prison; Erica was five years old at that time.

It was her older sister who ran the home and brought Erica up. The harsh conditions at home left a deep impact on the Erica.

She was enamoured by the world of glamour and began sketching dresses at the age of eight. She was interested in performing arts as a child and got her first experience of success when she won the MTV Jenifer Lopez Look-Alike contest at the age of 14.

Erica has had a number of affairs. She met American actor and rapper Bow Wow on the hip hop and R&B music video show 106 & Park and got into a relationship with him, during which she had a miscarriage. She has been linked to actor Shad Moss’s and Rich Dollaz as well. She has a son, King, from rapper Raul Conde, but the relationship again broke up and Erica decided to raise the child as a single mother. Thereafter, she was in a relationship with Hip Hop Season 4 co-star Cyn Santana, but the relationship broke up before they could say yes at the altar.

Erica Mena became engaged to Safaree Samuels in 2018. They got married in 2019 and welcomed their first child together, Safire. In May 2021, the couple announced that she's expecting her third child.