- 2 months ago
Laufey gets real and personal as she creates a sculpture of herself. From the first time she realized some differences from her identical twin to how her personal definition of beauty has evolved, hear Laufey break down all the things that make her who she is today. What would she say to her 13-year-old self? How does she know when a song is done? What's the difference between her public and private self?
Category
🛠️
LifestyleTranscript
00:00I mean I have such a toxic relationship with TikTok. I delete it and I download it again
00:05and I delete it and I download it again. It's like, it's like a man.
00:11Hi, I'm Leve and I'm going to be sculpting my self-portrait. I've been really curious to touch
00:17this. I have never used clay before and I wanted to challenge myself with a new art form. I'm also
00:25already famously really bad at drawing so I was going to see if I was bad at something else
00:32or perhaps really really good at something else. You never know. I'm very excited to perceive myself
00:39this deeply. I've been avoiding it thus far. I'm working on my eyes but it kind of looks like
00:44spider-man right now. I'm not gonna lie. I see all these videos like what kind of nose do you
00:48have?
00:48I don't know what nose I have. I feel like I never fit any of the categories. I've never considered
00:55changing anything really in my face which first of all I'm just very scared of. I think I'm a little
01:00scared of change but I'm also really scared of needles and things like that. Everyone's allowed
01:05to do whatever they want to themselves and I so celebrate doing whatever you want. I think for me
01:10I like sometimes when I even do too much makeup I look in the mirror and I'm like I get
01:15like dysmorphia.
01:16I'm like who am I? Like I don't recognize myself. So I think I'd be really freaked out. Also if
01:21I change
01:21something and my identical twin sister didn't we'd have like a before and after and it would
01:25kind of like and everybody it almost wouldn't be worth it unless we did it together. But I don't
01:31know I'm so I'm so proud of like I'm such a unique mix of cultures and I love how my
01:37mom looks and I
01:38love how my dad looks and I look just like I look like my mom and I'm really proud of
01:42that. So also
01:43my fans are so many of them are young women and I would never want to send some sort of
01:50false
01:50message about loving myself and then changing myself at the same time. It would feel a little
01:55dishonest for me. Okay this nose look looks really scary. I look like a bird. Oh no. Oh no. I
02:05look like
02:06a squidward. Maybe I just go a little more round. I think there was an age where I started to
02:17realize
02:17we had tiny differences like moles or like birthmarks. We have different ones that became kind of the way
02:25that we told ourselves apart. Like I had one here but then I had to get it removed. So that
02:31used to be
02:32the big tell of like who's Lever and who's Junia. Like I had a mole here and then she had
02:35a mole
02:36on her lip or above her lip. She still does. Mine sadly was aggressively cut out. I still have like
02:42a
02:42tiny little scar there. I don't know if I'm gonna add it but there were a lot of people who
02:46were like
02:46how are we gonna tell you apart now and I was like I just went under what are you talking
02:50about?
02:51Every single time someone like comes up to me on the street or something like I would say 90%
02:57of the time
02:58the first question is are you Lever and Junia? Or they'll be like are you? Which twin are you?
03:04Yeah. Does water help it stick? Does it make it slip? This kind of looks like when I got my
03:08scar removed.
03:09This is what the instruments look like.
03:17It was at a record store in Washington DC in 2020. These girls who were at a nearby
03:25conservatory and they played cello I think and they were like oh we like your videos of you playing
03:31cello and I was like what? That's crazy. And it was such a funny time because it was COVID too
03:36so
03:37you were not having any interaction with people and so it was like one of the first days you were
03:42allowed to go out and then it didn't happen for a very long time after that. But I always remember
03:47that it felt so appropriate that it was girls studying classical music. It was like this is my audience.
03:59I was an emotional kid. I thought so much about like who I was and who I was gonna be
04:04one day
04:04and I had so many hopes and dreams but I didn't feel confident enough in them happening that nowadays
04:11when I do things all I think about is my younger self and how she would have been proud or
04:16if I could
04:17go back and signal in some way that we're gonna be okay or like a guy's gonna think you're pretty
04:22at
04:23some point or you know you'll fall in love or people will actually like your music or you'll get to
04:29wear
04:29pretty dresses on stage one day. Everything I do is to kind of feed my younger self and I think
04:34I'm so aware of my audience and I want to show them that you can make your dreams come true
04:41and
04:42you are going to be the most perfect when you are the most you. Like when I've leaned into what
04:46makes
04:46me me I have always been the happiest but also found the most success. You can never be wrong when
04:52when you're being honest. If you go out to do something like becoming a musician or whatever you're
04:58going to encounter a lot of hate and you have to be ready to take it on and what's going
05:02to keep you
05:02going is if you truly believe that you're being honest and you agree with what you're doing. If
05:07someone's like that's a shitty song and I truly believe to my core that it is a wonderful song and
05:12I did my best I'll be like oh that that sucks because I really believe in it.
05:21For a really long time I thought that being skinny was like the only way to look pretty and I
05:29think
05:29that's just something I probably like picked up throughout society throwing it on me my whole
05:34life and recently I have just been so enamored by women's bodies that are like I don't know there's
05:44so many different ways of being beautiful and I think someone's soul being beautiful someone's aura
05:50being beautiful is that's like the peak of beauty to me. Strong women are so beautiful. It wasn't the outfit
05:57they were wearing or some sort of like feature they had it was just like almost like this energy
06:03that they were carrying and so I'm like how do you carry that energy and I think it's just about
06:06being
06:08confident in yourself and and loving yourself. I think that just glows beyond you.
06:18Growing up I thought I had a really round face and I was like I need to wear my hair
06:22down to optical
06:23illusion into more of a jawline and whatever. Oh that's a little scary. Oh the eyebrows if not placed
06:32at the same place you will look like you're questioning something just heads up if you're
06:37ever doing this just make sure the eyebrows are even or else you will look what's that mean that's like
06:52I had a fairly recent perspective shift where I feel like a lot of my happiness was relying on
06:59other people and I read this book on stoicism and a lot of it was talking about how if you
07:07get your happiness from things outside of yourself you're kind of doomed to not be happy like you need
07:13to learn to find happiness from yourself because that's the only thing you can control everything
07:18outside of your body you have no control over. I read it like a week ago. This is top of
07:23mind TBD if
07:24I implement it or not but I've been thinking about it almost every single day since I read it.
07:28Anytime I have something that's making me anxious or stressed I think about how I am assigning my
07:34happiness to that thing and if I can find a way to assign it to something inside myself just how
07:41I
07:41judge it how I judge that situation I can control my happiness or attempt to control it. Nobody has
07:47full control over their happiness but we can sure as hell try.
07:56Oh my god I'm still trying to find that balance I mean I have such a toxic relationship with TikTok
08:02I delete it and I download it again and I delete it and I download it again it's like it's
08:07like a man.
08:07I think for me I it's just learning about finding a healthy balance enough everything is
08:14bad if you have too much of it like it's like everything is okay in moderation. I think I have
08:21wanted to take more of a step away recently because I think it's kind of getting to a point where
08:27it's too
08:27much. Going viral is an interesting thing right I feel very lucky that a lot of my viral moments have
08:36come
08:36from me just like truly messing around and being myself and music so it's not necessarily about
08:46knowing exactly what's happening on the internet all the time I think honestly that can sometimes be
08:50detrimental when you're off the internet you bring a unique take onto the internet you know like you
08:56want to read everything about yourself you want to see what people are saying about yourself that's a very
09:02human need or human want rather and I think there's a healthy way of doing social media but
09:09I think most people are doing it in a very unhealthy way right now and I certainly got to an
09:13unhealthy
09:13place with it too so it's about finding rest. I feel like what I kind of had to tell myself
09:21this year
09:23with social media was I'm going to post what I want to post and I'm not going to just do
09:28it based
09:29off what's happening in the zeitgeist like I'm not going to go out of my way to do research on
09:34what's
09:34happening to try to click into it like if I I can only offer up what is authentic to me
09:41and what I
09:43do best which is at the end of the day music now I think I'm getting the hang of the
09:48clay oh she's
09:50kind of she's kind of girly she's getting a little pretty eyeliner it might be a winged eyeliner actually
09:59which is crazy because I cannot do a winged eyeliner to save my life
10:08I don't know how to do anything that doesn't feel like me like I reject anything that feels
10:13inauthentic really fast whether it's an outfit or a makeup look or sculpting yeah if you think about
10:21the things that make levecore levecore I think it's a mindset which is just a very romantic mindset but
10:28the style elements of it whether it's like ballet flats or skirts or tarzan shirts and ribbons like
10:36that's this is the way I've dressed my entire life like I've this isn't some sort of new style
10:41development for me I've literally been dressing like this since I was a kid like I used to trudge
10:48through winter storms in like skirts and ballet flats to school and blouses and literally would get made
10:55fun of for dressing like that because everybody was like really cool and wearing sweats and stuff
11:01I've never been on par with where the trends are although recently I guess people were like really
11:06into like ballet flats and loafers and stuff and honestly when I came in I was like oh my god
11:11no no no
11:12that means it's gonna go out and then I'm gonna be unfashionable
11:21I think it's great because you have like this out this person outside of yourself that understands
11:27you like they're within me I think it's really really good to work with Junia because she understands
11:34me better than anyone but she's still outside of me Junia if anything tries things first and then I
11:39adopt it like I think Junia is so fashionable and if I ever follow trends it's just whatever Junia is
11:47wearing
11:53I'm not very good at putting up a facade in any sort of way like all my emotions kind of
11:59show through
11:59immediately I feel like my most authentic self on stage honestly I feel like that's when I can
12:05let go of any judgment or shackles and for some reason when I'm on stage I just feel like the
12:11most me
12:12I think I judge myself a lot and I can put that aside on stage for some reason I should
12:18probably just
12:18be less hard on myself I'm working on a little bit of blush but it is more pronounced than I
12:23was expecting
12:25but it's okay we get the idea I think
12:33I probably would scoff at somebody saying this a couple years ago but I think I used to think that
12:39becoming successful in some way would make you immune to a lot of things like heartbreak or grief or
12:47anxiety or I don't know like any of those feelings and for me it's kind of turned it up you
12:55have to
12:56really know yourself and not question any corner of yourself because if you do and the world finds
13:04out you will crumble so I try to do hair and I don't think I should I don't think there's
13:10enough
13:11it looked like a toupee of some sort it's not happening we don't need hair unless it's five
13:16different colors ombre
13:20it's not happening oh earrings is kind of fun I almost feel like the earrings like emphasize that
13:26I'm bald whereas without the earrings it's like oh she's just doing her face you know
13:31so perhaps perhaps not am I done I don't know if I'm done
13:40at one point you just gotta let it fly I don't like to work on it too much because
13:44you could work on it forever I always respect what I did in the time that I was doing it
13:50like
13:50if I'm producing a song writing a song I'm like that was the decision I made that day that's a
13:54part
13:55of the art unless it's bothering me to the point where I have to change it but everything's pretty
13:59everything's pretty raw like everything the vocals you hear on my songs the string playing the
14:05everything is pretty much done like the first day I do it and then I don't really go back and
14:09change much
14:10it just needs something to make it look like me a little bit more let's see should I put contacts
14:19in I'm blind as a bat it's astigmatism contacts maybe I should give her glasses that'll make it feel
14:27like me I was three years old when we found out that I had astigmatism and so did my twin
14:33sister so
14:34we both had these matching Harry Potter classes wow yes indeed
14:44she looks so scared honestly people tell me I look scared all the time so maybe this makes sense
14:49I'm not making this up this feels more like me now I didn't use the tools very much they were
14:55all a
14:55little intimidating I'm not gonna lie it's like yes very much it's like what do you know tell me
15:06everything you know
15:13I'm ready are you guys ready
15:20what I got right was the astigmatism and I think my eyebrow and eye color I think we were really
15:26close I love a little bit of blush blindness the nose is not my nose but I think it's
15:35fine the lips I think that's the correct size I like the color I would wear it myself and I
15:43think she
15:43she should just smile more though I kind of hated perceiving myself I'm not gonna lie
15:50but I loved the conversation and I think I've sorted out a lot of my thoughts today
15:57she looks nerdy as hell she's probably listening to Mozart or something but like glasses off
16:03she's listening to brat I think
16:08like a little 360 you know yeah do you see it at the rave thank you so much vanity fair
16:15this was so
16:16fun I have loved putting my face together with clay and yeah thank you
16:24you
Comments