Ireland Baldwin, 22, is the face of Guess jeans. In the campaign, she’s confident and self-possessed, but in real life, says the daughter of Alec Baldwin and Kim Basinger, that wasn’t always the case.
When she was getting started as a model, Baldwin became “fixated” on reading everything that was written about her. And that meant going down a toxic rabbit hole of very mean trolls.
“I saw what people were saying about me, that of course I was modeling because I was so-and-so’s daughter. ‘She’s fat, she’s disgusting.’ I would get so down on myself,” she says during an appearance on Megyn Kelly TODAY.
For her, the turning point was realizing that none of this was helpful, and only made her feel more insecure. “This is going to bring me down,” she realized.
So she decided that “today, I am going to stop reading these comments and stop caring. I stopped altogether looking at articles and paparazzi photos. I used to be crazy about my double chin, or the bad angle of my butt. I’m not even going to look anymore. I owe it to myself.”
That’s made her love herself, and turned her into an advocate for self-acceptance on social media. “We all get to this point where we’re either going to accept who we are, or we’re going to make it so difficult for ourselves to accept what we’ve been given,” she says.
In very atypical model mode, Baldwin says she doesn’t count calories or obsess over what’s on her plate. She works out “hard,” saying that her passion for boxing helps her stay fit.
“I don’t eat well at all. I go through so many phases. I’m eating more vegan one month, or vegetarian, or I have a burger again. I’m such a foodie. I hate missing out. I hate salad beyond anything in the world. I love my wine. I need to eat fun food,” she says.
Bon appetit!