Born at Brooke, Norfolk, England as Barry Kenneth Cossey, she is one of the world's most famous transsexual people and the first to ever pose for Playboy. Though she was born biologically male, she was said to pass so flawlessly because she was always extremely feminine. Tall and thin, she was often taken as female even before her transition beginning at the age of 16.

Both prior to and following breast augmentation surgery, she performed as a showgirl in Paris, France. However, after the surgery, she danced topless, which helped her to earn money for her sexual reassignment surgery. She eventually had the surgery at London's Charing Cross Hospital.

Once through with transition, and with the nameCaroline Cossey, the six-foot-tall brunette achieved moderate success as an up-and-coming model. Under her stage name "Tula", she was also cast in a small part in the 1981 Bond 007 movie For Your Eyes Only and she was featured in the music video "Some Like it Hot" by Power Station.

Since being "outed" by a British tabloid, she has fought for her right to legally marry a man and to be recognized by the law as a woman.

In her autobiography, My Story (published in 1991), Tula discussed her sex reassignment and how she changed from Barry to Caroline. She had had a difficult relationship (1989-1990) with Greek shipping tycoon, Elias Fattal, because his family forbade him to marry her.

In 1992 she married Canadian architect, David Finch, having announced her engagement on the "Shirley" show. Tula became very active in the transsexual community in England and around the world, and she's the first post-operative transsexual to have posed nude in Playboy magazine.

Caroline is now married and lives with her husband David in Atlanta, Georgia. There, Tula worked as advertising model (appearing in the widely-seen "Life is Harsh" campaign ad for Sauza Tequila), four-time Playboy model, and "James Bond girl" (For Your Eyes Only); she also starred in the music video for the Duran Duran song Rio.

She has been confused with American actress Eileen Davidson since the 1980s, although Davidson has always been a woman.