The stars met during a star-studded barbecue at the late photographer Herb Ritts' home.
The couple married when Crawford was 25 and Gere was 42 only to divorce in 1995 after four years of marriage, Us magazine reported.
"There were a lot of really cool people there. I was like, 'Wow! Jack Nicholson!' I was 21. It was still all new to me. I met Richard Gere there. We pretty much started dating right away. When I was with him, that's when I was becoming well-known as well," Crawford said during Oprah's Master Class.
"I think I was more willing at 22 to be, like, 'Okay, I'll follow,' but then you start going, 'Well, I don't want to just follow -- I want to lead sometimes and I want to walk side by side sometimes.'"
Crawford says she looks back with great fondness to her marriage to Gere.
"Richard's a super smart guy, and he's interesting, and he's interested, and I learned a lot about the world. It was a great chapter in my life," she said.