When I was 11, Cara Delevingne lent me her neon-pink electric guitar for a class recital. She was in the year above me at our Hampshire boarding school, an effervescent pre-teen with a natural ability to find the fun in any situation, and with this gesture she helped turn the daunting task of playing a rock song in front of my peers into an exciting one.
I tell you this not because it set me on track to become the next Jimi Hendrix – it did not – but because Cara’s small act of kindness felt monumental to me; she had been a friend when I needed one. And as I’ve watched her shine on the world stage, her sensibility is always palpable; in the way she lifts up her friends, in the purposeful projects she takes on, and in her choice to share deeply personal experiences so that others might feel brighter for it.
"Back then I was way more into the look than the actual guitar," she says, laughing as we reminisce. "I was like, 'I want to be Avril Lavigne!' God, it was hysterical." I remember her as very much a tomboy, usually dressed in baggy tracksuits and trainers, and often found at break times eating a hot roll filled with melted cheese, ham and crinkle-cut crisps or sneaking off into the bushes to smoke. She was impish but charming, universally popular; and her striking looks would have been the last on a long list of qualities you would have used to describe her. Certainly, none of us would have predicted that she would go on to become the most famous supermodel of our generation. (We might have been less surprised that she counts Paris Hilton, Malala Yousafzai and Zendaya among the cool 43.5 million followers she has amassed on social media, for her ability to make friends knows no bounds.)
We are speaking over Zoom because she is currently in New York filming season two of the Steve Martin-created series Only Murders in the Building. Even through a screen, she is as vibrant and kinetic as ever, shifting about on her chair and tousling her messy blonde hair as we talk. Bare-faced and wearing two hoodies layered on top of each other with her signature skinny jeans and chunky boots, she is eating her way with relish through a large breakfast of sausages and bacon in a side-room of the studio where her Bazaar photo-shoot is taking place.
Part of Cara’s entourage is her chihuahua-terrier Alfie, who, like his mistress, is used to being constantly on the move. When the Covid lockdown was mandated in her current base of Los Angeles, she says: "That was the longest time I’ve ever spent anywhere on the ground. It’s crazy to say, but it put a lot into perspective of why we are all pushing ourselves to work all the time. It was a really interesting experience." While she is resolute that England will always be her home, she has created her very own Californian Wonderland –what she describes as an "adult playhouse", complete with a secret passageway shaped like a birth canal, where she goes ‘to think’ and comes out "rebirthed and cleansed". (Succession fans should note that she installed this months before Kendall Roy created the vagina-tunnel entranceway to his 40th birthday party.) There’s also a ball-pit, which she says is beloved by grown-ups and their children alike, remarking: "It’s so nice to see people be a kid again"– herself included.
Born in London to a society darling and stylist, Pandora (whose own mother was Princess Margaret’s lady-in-waiting), and Charles, a property developer, Cara was raised in Belgravia. She grew up with her two older sisters, Poppy, now a model and actress, and Chloe, who co-founded the Lady Garden cervical-cancer fund, as well as her paternal half-brother Alexander, a writer and film producer. From the outside, it seems like a perfect upbringing, but, Cara says, "Everyone has something they go through with their family. My life I feel was very stressful, because there was quite a lot of chaos, not being sure if people were OK or not." She’s referring to her mother who, long before her daughters were born, battled heroin addiction and was later diagnosed with manic depression, from which she suffered when her girls were young.
School provided an escape for Cara, who enthusiastically joined in with any and all activities, from dorm raids to dance shows. But there came a point when she started to experience her own psychological crisis. "I dropped out, and I really just wanted to be able to prove that I wasn’t the deadbeat I thought I was. When you have mental-health struggles, you can’t see anything, it blinds you," she says. I find it difficult to grasp how Cara could ever have considered herself a deadbeat, but perhaps the sunny way she presented herself was a kind of front – a way of escaping her angst. When she signed with Storm model management at the age of 17 she had severe depression and anxiety, though she was less than a year away from exploding onto the fashion scene, following Christopher Bailey’s decision to cast her as the face of Burberry’s spring/summer 2011 campaign. She doesn’t remember much of those early months of her career; she hadn’t been given the time to stop and take it all in. "I was working every single day, something like 98 days consecutively. It was all happening so fast and it was amazing, but it was a lot."
Modelling was not something she had ever set her sights on; what she really wanted to do was act, and her drive to do so was obvious early on. (She once broke her foot in the middle of a school play, but doggedly continued on until the end, when she was then carted off to hospital.) "I gave modelling a lot of flak for being something that wasn’t hard, but are you kidding me? I hated wearing heels, and I couldn’t walk in them. It took me a long time to learn how to model."
Another challenge she faced was navigating life under a spotlight, particularly at an age when most of us are still testing the waters of adulthood. If ever she slipped up with partying, drugs or drinking, it was made torturously public by the paparazzi. But Cara has forged strong bonds with a coterie of starry women who have looked out for her. "It’s been so useful to have friends in the industry because I’ve had so many people help guide me through things I wouldn’t have known how to manage," she says, name-checking Rihanna, "who was there when I was really becoming famous", and Taylor Swift, who she met at the 2013 Victoria’s Secret fashion show.
It’s hard to believe that Cara is still only 29, because to list her achievements is dizzying. She consciously resists definition, leaping with both feet into her multitude of passions and continually surprising those who assume that she is just a pretty face (more fool them). She has acted alongside Orlando Bloom in Amazon’s Carnival Row, sung backing vocals on Fiona Apple’s latest album, co-founded two not-for-profit organisations in the name of climate action, and became a co-owner of a sex-toy brand – all within the last couple of years. "It doesn’t make sense to have to be one thing. People ask me, 'How was it transitioning from being a model to an actress?' I’m not transitioning anywhere; I’m never going to stop modelling."
It is just as well because, as a Face of Dior, she currently fronts the elegant new Dior Joaillerie Rose des Vents campaign. It was the house’s creative director Maria Grazia Chiuri who designed Cara’s white trousers and breast plate ensemble that she wore at last year’s Met Gala, boldly emblazoned with the words ‘Peg thePatriarchy’ in red. "It was a really amazing thing for Dior to allow me to do," says Cara. "Obviously it’s a bit tongue-in-cheek, but what it meant was, 'We’re working together as women.' I think Maria Grazia does such a great job of showing women in a very strong and beautiful way, and every Dior fashion show I’ve seen always has a powerful message. It also doesn’t hurt that everything has “CD” on it, so it’s monogrammed for me. That’s the coolest thing ever," she adds, with a gleeful smile.
Her Met Gala outing was not the first time Cara has combined fashion with activism: last year she unveiled a capsule collection for Pride Month with Puma, a celebration close to her heart. Since coming out as pansexual in 2017 (meaning she can be attracted to someone regardless of their gender) she has opened up conversations around sexual fluidity, lamenting the lack of LGBTQ+ role models she had as a teenager. "I do think I would have hated myself less, I would have not been so ashamed, if I’d had someone." She is now working on a documentary with the BBC exploring sexuality, identity and gender across the globe. "The one thing I’m happy about growing up queer and fighting it and hiding it is it gives me so much fire and drive to try to make people’s lives easier in some way by talking about it."
While Cara may be unreserved when discussing her own sexuality, she has learnt to be careful when speaking about her partners past and present. "When you have a relationship, there’s definitely an element of it being exposed," she begins, "especially with coming out and being in public relationships, like when I was with Annie [Clark, the musician known professionally as St Vincent]. But now I really value my privacy so much, so no one can put their ideas and comments on it." Since she and her previous girlfriend, the actress Ashley Benson, split in 2020, Cara has taken a break from dating. "It’s been nice to be single. I hadn’t spent time to really work on myself because I had been in back-to-back relationships for a while."
She wrote a coming-of-age mystery novel in 2017 led by a gay main character, "to represent and talk about queerness". But this was also a personal challenge to herself, as Cara has dyspraxia (a problem with coordinating her thoughts and movements), which she tried to control at school by taking up the drums to burn off excess energy. One thing is certain: no one could ever accuse her of being lazy. "I have a lot of ideas, and there’s a constant list in my brain of things I need to finish," she relates, her knee bouncing at the thought of it. "It makes me a little bit stressed, but it also keeps me going. Because if you ever finish that list, then what?" She relies on yoga and meditation to re-centre herself, practising breath control to "get out of your head and into your body", and now starts her day with at least five minutes of yoga before turning her phone on.
Writing music is also something she does for herself, even though performing live is one of her biggest fears. "Especially if it’s my own music that I’ve written, which is usually very, very personal," she explains. "If someone doesn’t like my acting, or my work as a model, or the way I look, that’s OK; but when it’s my music, that’s different." But as she gets older, she is less concerned with what people think, so the idea of expressing herself through song publicly is perhaps less nerve-racking."I’m more comfortable in that sense."
This coming August Cara turns 30, and she’s looking forward to it. "Getting older is so nice," she says in earnest, but later adds: "I’m so excited, but call me on the day and see how I’m doing – I’ll probably cry." I wonder if there’s anything she is looking to make more time for in this new decade of her life. "I want to have babies," she says, beaming. "But not yet. I buy children’s clothes for my future child who doesn’t exist. Baby shoes really get me – they break my heart. I went shopping the other day and I bought these tiny Air Jordans, which are purple and they have a lion on them. I’m manifesting..."
While it might seem to be a celebrity eccentricity, this playful sense of ‘Why not buy the baby shoes?’ is Cara to the core. She is as unchanged as one can be by global super-stardom, but has a profound understanding of herself that feels new. This she attributes to the insight that comes from withstanding the kind of emotional storms she faced in adolescence and coming out the other side with awareness of what brings her joy. "Connection is the most important thing in the world and helping people is one of the most amazing things you can do." She pauses to consider her parting words. "Always lead with kindness." With that, she hugs the screen goodbye.
The March issue of Harper's Bazaar, starring Cara Delevingne, is available to buy from 2 February.
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