Arterton was born Christina Gemma Arterton in Gravesend, Kent, the elder daughter of Sally-Anne (née Heap), a cleaner, and Barry Arterton, a welder. Arterton was born with polydactyly,and was brought up, along with her sister, Hannah Jane (born 1989, Gravesend), by their single mother, on a council estate in Gravesend.Arterton's parents divorced when she was five, and her father remarried in 1996.Arterton worked as a makeup salesgirl. She attended Painters Ash Primary School in Northfleet, then attended Gravesend Grammar School for Girls on Pelham Road in Gravesend, she took a performance arts course at The Miskin Theatre in Dartford (part of North West Kent College) and trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art on a full grant.
In 2008, she appeared in the James Bond film, Quantum of Solace. Chosen from around 1,500 candidates, Arterton plays Bond Girl Strawberry Fields, in what is described as a "nice-sized role". On her character, Arterton describes Strawberry Fields as "the thinking man's crumpet". In 2008, she played the eponymous protagonist in the BBC adaptation of Thomas Hardy's Tess of the D'Urbervilles. Also in 2008, she played the role of Elizabeth Bennet in the ITV serial Lost in Austen, albeit a reduced role from the original Pride & Prejudice. Her most controversial role was in the 2009 film The Disappearance of Alice Creed in which Arterton's character is kidnapped and abused in several graphic nude She is the face of Avon's Bond Girl 007 fragrance which launched in October 2008. Having already started in a series of low-key adverts for cosmetics company Avon, in May 2008, Arterton requested a role opposite model Kate Moss for Rimmel, but was blocked on contractual terms under her Avon contract.