Lorde is now 24, but when she first became a global star at the age of 16, she managed to avoid some of the pitfalls that have plagued other teen female pop stars.
“It’s such a tender time, being a teenager. You are changing so rapidly. Everything about me was changing. And to have that scrutiny — it was no joke,” she tells The Irish Times. “I had extremely healthy boundaries around it as a teenager. There were just things I wasn’t going to do if they weren’t comfortable for me to do.”
She continues, “I wore the exact outfits I felt like wearing. I wore suits. I loved suits. I felt powerful in them. The fact that I sort of did it in a way that felt right for me — that meant I don’t look back and feel f****d up by it.
With regard to becoming famous at such a young age, Lorde says, “For the most part I feel I’m fairly unscathed by the experience.”
But with everyone from Billie Eilish to Taylor Swift speaking out about how public scrutiny of their bodies caused them mental distress, how did she avoid a similar experience?
“I sort of kicked that out the conversation,” she explains. “I was pretty intent about that. I didn’t want people to be talking about what my body looked like. I was a kid. So it definitely was something I very specifically did not invite.”
She adds, “I think it all worked out. How my body looks is not a big center of curiosity now. Which I think is in part because of the grounding I lay as a teenager. So yeah — I feel good about baby me doing that for future me.”
Lorde is set to release a new song, “Mood Ring,” today.
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