Carla Körbes was born in Porto Alegre, Brazil, and grew up in São Leopoldo, taking classes at Ballet Vera Bublitz in Porto Alegre. In 1996, at the age of 15, she moved to the United States to enter into the School of American Ballet. In 2000, Ms. Körbes joined New York City Ballet as a member of the corps de ballet. She was promoted to the rank of soloist in 2005. Later that same year, she joined Pacific Northwest Ballet as a soloist and was promoted to principal dancer in 2006. Ms. Körbes’ repitoire includes leading roles in many of the major works of George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins and has also worked closely with choreographers such as Christopher Wheeldon and Alexei Ratmansky. Ms. Körbes has performed the lead roles in Swan Lake, Giselle, Sleeping Beauty and Don Quixote. Ms. Körbes was named one of “25 to watch” by Dance Magazine in 2006. In 2012, in a review of the Vail International Dance Festival, Alastair Macaulay stated that Körbes "is one of the finest ballerinas appearing in America today” After announcing her retirement from PNB in September 2014, Körbes gave a final performance on June 7th 2015. Following her final performance, Körbes accepted a position with the LA Dance Project as associate artistic director.