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I DIED AND WENT TO ISABELLA LOVESTORY HEAVEN

ISABELLA wears BRA + HEELS by WOMEN'S HISTORY MUSUEM, PANTS from STYLIST'S ARCHIVE, JEWELRY by MARTINE ALI

In a media landscape crowded with copy-paste industry plants, this self-proclaimed DIY popstar is a breath of fresh air. She's not afraid to surprise us and in doing so, leaves the door open for another Cinderella story to happen... but this time it’s absurdly sexy.

 

Read the full interview below where we discuss everything from Tumblr Academy to Eurotrash summers.

ISABELLA wears BRA + HEELS by WOMEN'S HISTORY MUSUEM, PANTS from STYLIST'S ARCHIVE, JEWELRY by MARTINE ALI

 

Hey Isabella, nice to meet you.

 

Ooh, ciao Bella. I'm in Montreal and this is my dog.

 

 

What's their name?

 

His name is Flaco which means skinny. But he's not skinny, he's chubby. That's the irony of life.

 

 

I heard that the vibes on set were amazing. I was so sad that I couldn't be there.

 

It was so fun. It was crazy vibes. I've always wanted to shoot with Joaquin because I've known him forever. I met him like five years ago in Mexico and yeah… he tore that. We didn't want to leave, we just wanted to keep going.

 

 

Were you feeling gorgeous on set?

 

Gorgeous as always. It was a whirlwind. I've been nonstop for three months. Well, this whole year. I'm not complaining at all, I'm so happy. But sometimes I'm like, “Where the fuck am I?” Like, I don't know where I am. I just go and do this thing and then I go to sleep. I think I was feeling tired but excited. I always put my Lady Gaga mode on.

ISABELLA wears FULL LOOK by BALENCIAGA.

 

There were a lot of Tumblr vibes happening, were you a Tumblr girl?

 

Yessss back in the day I grew up with Tumblr Academy. That’s what we call it…for students. I think I went on Tumblr when I was 13 and I met so many of my best friends on it. And now I see so many creative people killing it. Like, Hari Nef was on it and Dara from Interview Magazine. So many random successful creative people were on Tumblr Academy. It was amazing because I was always an outsider in my schools and everything. I was such a freakazoid and I went online and I met all my freakazoid friends.

 

 

 

I feel like that style is kind of coming back a little. Is that an aesthetic or are there any aesthetics that you didn't think you'd be down for and now you're experimenting with?

 

Yeah, totally. I think people are feeling nostalgic. Honestly, I was always super inspired by the 90s Japanese fashion vibe and 80s fashion as well. But now it's called Indie Sleaze…and I'm like, well… I hate when things get a name and they categorize things. I’m just super anti and I always want to be against the grain, which I guess can be very annoying and pretentious. I hate to say that I’m a gatekeeper but I totally am.

 

 

Sometimes you have to be.

 

That’s something I love about K-POP, they really exploit the trends so much and I try to be like that too and have that troll-y mentality of I'm just going to wear one super, super trendy outfit to troll.

 

 

So kind of making fun of it, but also you still get to wear the cute outfit?

 

Yeah, exactly. It's all performance art.

ISABELLA wears DRESS by WIEDERHOEFT, JEWELRY by MARTINE ALI.

 

The last time that you spoke with office was in 2020 which is crazy!

 

That's when I started my career. It was with Ivan. Wait. Oh, my God. I think you guys did my first article! I had no Botox in my face. Nothing. Just pure youth. Oh, this is so cute.

 

 

You had just started collaborating with Chicken that year. I see you guys are still going strong in your creative partnership. Does it mean a lot to still be working together now that there's been so much growth?

 

Yes, we've really been through the trenches with our creativity and what we can do. He's a Scorpio, so he's very deep, very intense. I'm very deep and intense as well so I think we appreciate that about each other, that we can just go really deep and raw in our creative process. We have very similar tastes and we really went deep with this album. We could do a lot of experimenting because we both come from a very experimental punk mentality of what music can be because we both didn't study music at all. We come from a fine arts school background…Well, I'm a dropout. He's not. He's smart.

 

We really have fun with not having a structure or a rule book when we make music. We come from a very open mind so I think that's what we love about each other.

 

 

So you guys can be really free and do random stuff together?

 

Yeah, exactly. Like, we never think, oh, we can't sample this or we can't mix this cumbia beat with this 80s new wave sound. We have a very open mind and free playground to do whatever we want. We're also super down, now that we’ve figured out what we like to do in music, to work with other people. I'm super excited to explore new grounds and see what I can do for sure.

 

 

 

Are there any people that you've been looking at maybe collaborating with that you haven't yet?

 

I'm always working with people but it always has to feel really organic. I'm working with my friend Mechatok a lot and we have a song coming out and I also just met with Zach Hill from Death Grips which was epic. And who else? Let me think. Right now I'm working with Mechatok, Kamixlo, and friends. I'm always going to gravitate towards friends because I can have my opinion on the production more as well.

TOP LEFT + BOTTOM RIGHT: ISABELLA wears DRESS by DENIZ BLUMENSTEIN, HEELS by DSQUARED2, NECKLACE + EARRINGS by MARTINE ALI, BRACELET by ALEXIS BITTAR.

 

BOTTOM LEFT: ISABELLA wears FULL LOOK by BALENCIAGA.

 

I was watching your music video for Telenovela. So much happened all at the same time. Tell me more about what the process was like for making that.

 

I always want to exaggerate everything and with my themes, I take it to an absurd, surreal level. So I think with Telenovela, I had so much to play with, and I was inspired by tv and technology (super David Cronenberg vibe). I made a moodboard and sent it to Charlotte Rutherford, who's a genius, and we just kept talking about ideas texting non-stop manically about what we could do. She's crazy and she’s done a lot of K-Pop videos with crazy CGI. She just wants to take it to another level. We both have satirical brains so we just clicked really well and had so much fun. We just always want to take it to the next level, like I got pregnant with the tv at the end it was perfect. We're crazy, it was a perfect match.

 

 

The baby at the end was the cherry on top.

 

I miss him. I don't know where he is right now. Did he have a name? Barbarella (tv baby’s name).

 

 

Did you watch telenovelas growing up?

 

Yeah I watched so many because I grew up there [Honduras]. My favorite was this one called Floricienta which is an Argentinian modern day take on Cinderella. Her fashion is just amazing. She was my fashion icon because she had this scrappy y2k fashion Cinderella vibe so it looked like she made her outfits herself.

 

 

Were there any plot lines that stuck with you?

 

This one. At the moment I’m obsessed with Cinderella. I'm obsessed with modernizing fairy tales and making them more realistic or darker somehow. [She sends me a pic of the girl from Floricienta] She's cute right? I love the way she dresses and her storyline. I love a Cinderella story because I feel like I'm Cinderella.

LEFT: ISABELLA wears DRESS by DENIZ BLUMENSTEIN, HEELS by DSQUARED2, NECKLACE + EARRINGS by MARTINE ALI, BRACELET by ALEXIS BITTAR.

 

RIGHT: ISABELLA wears BRA + HEELS by WOMEN’S HISTORY MUSEUM, PANTS from STYLIST’S ARCHIVE, EARRINGS + BELLY BUTTON RING by MARTINE ALI.

 

Why do you feel like you're Cinderella?

 

Because I’ve always done things myself. I'm a self-proclaimed DIY pop star which is a conundrum. Pop stars are supposed to be some sort of product or machine-made, impossibly beautiful object but I kind of just did it all myself which is crazy. It's kind of part of the joke… the concept is a conundrum to me. It's like Frankenstein or something. I crafted this janky persona but that's part of the charm.

 

 

Do you feel like you would have an alter ego version?

You could never have enough alter egos. To be honest, I don't think Isabella Lovestory is an alter ego, it's more just an exaggeration of who I am inside and I’m putting it out. But…I do want to become a spy. I want to have a spy alter ego, after this crazy, psychedelic, and colorful era I’m gonna go back to being like Irma Vep. I always want to do something completely different from what I did before.

 

 

I mean if you do become a spy no one will ever know because you won't be able to tell us.

 

Exactly, I just love how spies have different looks and different wigs. I already feel like I'm a spy because I have so many different places where I live. Like when I go to LA, I'm the bimbo, health guru, yoga girl. And then when I go to London [she says, in a British accent] I'm a rock star. And then in New York I’m a [lets out a pretty sigh] party girl. I love having different personalities.

 

 

Do you have any Eurotrash on the schedule this summer?

 

Yes I was actually just doing my little Eurotrash moment in Paris and Spain. I performed at Primavera and We Love Green and did a trashy fairy tale performance with little unicorns dancing and twerking in the back…my DJ was my Prince Charming but with like… a Freddy Krueger mask and I was the trashy little Cinderella girl. Well, in Paris I was a French maid and in Spain I was a princess so I went from the maid to the princess.

 

 

Keep them guessing.

 

Exactly! This summer I’m gonna practice for my tour that's coming up in the fall and finish two music videos that are almost done. I'm just super down to have fun this summer because I've been working so hard on this album. I just want to go to the beach.

LEFT: ISABELLA wears BOW by BALENCIAGA.

 

RIGHT: ISABELLA wears DRESS by WIEDERHOEFT, JEWELRY by MARTINE ALI.

 

So you said you're working on two new music videos right now… can we know anything about that or is it a secret?

 

Well one is the Eurotrash one that I shot with this girl named Victoria Davidoff. She's in LA and she's amazing. We shot it in LA a month and a half ago and it's me in a carriage with two Eurotrash girls (hotties) with lots of green screens. The other one is for Vanity, the main track of the album, which I shot in Paris. That one is really crazy and epic. It’s shot with film and it's kind of an Alice in Wonderland vibe… but like in an office it's kind of weird. I love making videos, that's my favorite part.

 

 

What are the ingredients for a good Eurotrash summer?

 

Lots of plastic wigs. Lots of plastic everything. Lots of plastic rhinestones. Fake bootleg handbags… the more bootleg the better. Just become the most bootleg princess that you can be.

 

 

Is there anything you're doing after this?

 

Releasing more music! After this album comes out, I’m putting out a deluxe or remix. And then after that, more music and then after more music and more music. I really want to release two more projects this year because I feel like I've been working on making it all last year and the year before so I just want to release release release release so be on the lookout for my next music videos.

 

 

Okay I'm so excited. Ciao bella.

 

Ciao, have fun in Italy. I love Monica Bellucci. 

TOP RIGHT + BOTTOM LEFT: ISABELLA wears TIARA by UNTITLED & CO, SKIRT by DENIZ BLUMENSTEIN, HEELS by CALVIN KLEIN ℅ GRAILED, BELLY BUTTON RING by MARTINE ALI.

 

TOP LEFT + BOTTOM RIGHT: ISABELLA wears BRA + HEELS by WOMEN’S HISTORY MUSEUM, PANTS from STYLIST’S ARCHIVE, EARRINGS + BELLY BUTTON RING by MARTINE ALI.

Listen to Vanity here.

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