It’s Monday morning, and Julia Fox is doing her skincare routine while vaping and wearing a floor-length fur coat. We’re in an industrial warehouse in Brooklyn, N.Y., for her FASHION cover shoot. She arrives alone (a rarity in the world of celebs) and apologizes for keeping us waiting. “I woke up late and had to rush to take my son to school,” she shares. (Fox also apparently missed the memo about the pre-arranged car service and drove herself to set — another anomaly.) “I haven’t done anything — not even brushed my teeth!”
Top, $535, Puppets and Puppets. Pants, $595, Re-Pull. Ring (top), $2,545, and ring (bottom), $1,750, John Hardy.
Plopping her tiny Y2K-inspired shoulder bag onto the table, she begins to unpack big containers of moisturizer in a Mary Poppins-esque montage. Not bothering to roll up her furry sleeves, she slathers on two products: Lait-Crème Concentré by Embryolisse and Homeopasmine (a Vaseline-like product usually used for nipple chafing). Together, the creams cost about $60. “I’m not really into those 13-step beauty routines,” Fox admits. “I mean, who has time for all that?” Certainly not her.
Depending on who you talk to, Fox’s fame can be linked to any number of things. Many would surely know her as Adam Sandler’s girlfriend in 2019’s Uncut Gems. Those who missed the movie would probably recognize her as Ye’s (formerly known as Kanye West) 30-day dalliance and dress-up doll. But for most fans under 40, Fox is more than her filmography or flings; she’s a viral icon, a charismatic sound bite and a fashion alchemist whose extreme outfits have included everything from condoms to literal flames.
Soon to be added to her ever-growing resumé is judge and co-host (alongside legendary stylist Law Roach) of the upcycling competition show OMG Fashun, which is premiering on May 6 on E! She teases that it’s a “campier” Project Runway — new artists will be brought in every episode to turn trash into treasures. “I want to advocate for sustainability,” Fox says of why she got involved in this project. “I want to show people that fast fashion is ruining the world. And I think anyone with a brain would want a one-of-a-kind piece rather than some mass-produced sh*t that every Becky in the world has.”
True to her reputation, Fox does not mince her words. Every sentence ends with a firm period and is spoken with such conviction that you can’t not accept it as the truth. On the topic of self-love: “Nobody truly loves themselves.” On her three-year-old son, Valentino: “He’s my anchor, which is awesome but can also suck.” On fashion: “I don’t want to wear something pretty — pretty is boring.” You get the idea. And while many have speculated about whether her bluntness is a branding shtick or true authenticity, I’m not sure it matters. (Though, for the record, I do think Julia is just being Julia.) During a time when everyone’s images are so curated and words are so calculated, Fox dares to be messy and sometimes a little trashy — and the internet loves her for it.
Even when you win, men will say it’s luck. But I think that’s why women kill it all the time — there’s no room for failure.
If you’ve read Down the Drain, her 2023 bestselling autobiography, you know that Fox’s life reads like a crossover episode of Euphoria and The Sopranos — only with more heroin. Her tumultuous childhood started in Milan (she was born to an Italian mother and an American father) but very quickly had her bouncing between odd spots in New York. Think sleeping on a boat one week, squatting in buildings her father was renovating the next and in friends’ houses, a boyfriend’s drug den, a sugar-daddy-owned loft and a number of other dicey living situations.
At 16, her absentee parents put out a “missing” poster for her, which covered the city, but they reported her birth year, height and weight wrong. Shortly after, she overdosed on PCP after a stint in a psychiatric ward. And in her final year of high school, she became a dominatrix after seeing a Craigslist ad. Mix in multiple abusive relationships, being banned from Bloomingdale’s for stealing and buying 200 cockroaches to unleash at her ex-boyfriend’s nightclub and you get a true picture of a rebel with far too many causes. “It was like I became an investigative journalist for my own life,” Fox says of writing her memoir. (Most of her memories from her younger years are quite foggy.) “It was a weird form of therapy. For the first time, I really just had to sit with my past and dissect it.”
Considering her many highs and even more lows, I ask Fox if she has any regrets. Taking a drag of her vape — like she’s a character in a Scorsese movie — she replies: “Yeah, I have a few. But ultimately I wouldn’t change anything. I have to trust that there’s something bigger at play and one day it will all make sense.”
Fox has famously said that she always knew she was going to be famous. She explains that everywhere she went, she somehow became a household name, with friends regularly telling her she was going to be a star. And while she admits to liking attention, she never wanted this much attention. Though, ironically, she points out that no one admits to wanting to be famous because “it’s tacky.”
Dress (worn as a top), $1,185, skirt, $430, pants, $205, and shoes, price upon request, Patrycja Pagas. Bracelet, $525, AGMES.
Sculpture photography By Daniel Kukla, courtesy of Friedman Benda and Misha Kahn.
SCULPTURE PHOTOGRAPHY BY DANIEL KUKLA, COURTESY OF FRIEDMAN BENDA AND MISHA KAHN.
Dress, price upon request, Advisry. Tights, $75, Wolford. Bracelet (left), $610, and bracelet (right), $930, AGMES.
Top, $495, and skirt, $395, Sid Neigum. Earring (left), $265 for a pair, and bracelet, $425, Lady Grey. Earring (right), $620 for a pair, AGMES.
But then she digresses: “I always saw the pitfalls of fame. I grew up in the Britney Spears era, and I understood that anonymity is a gift. I didn’t want fame, but now that I have it, I wouldn’t not want to have it.” Fox stops herself and backtracks a little — the only time during our hour-long chat that she seems uncertain about her words. “I don’t know — it really just depends on how I’m feeling. Some days, I f*cking hate it and I’m like, ‘Why did I get myself into this?’ And other days, I’m so grateful to be in this position where I can have this platform. It all really depends.”
Fox would love to one day fade into the background and let her work speak for itself, but she doesn’t think she’ll have that luxury until she’s older. Of course, grocery shopping in only her underwear might not be helping. Or the fact that she calls the paparazzi on herself — something every celeb does but will never acknowledge. “I don’t call them when I’m in my regular clothes, which some people do to keep their name in the headlines,” she says with a twinkle in her eye. “I do it when my look is amazing — if I have a designer I’m obsessed with and I want them to have their moment.”
As such, Fox isn’t interested in following the “unwritten celebrity code” of wearing luxury brands. Instead, she’s inspired by new talent doing new and unconventional things. “I’m looking for a designer who thinks outside the box, goes against the grain or does something I’ve never seen before,” she says. She adds that she’s only interested in wearing wearable art. And to say her taste is specific would be a bit of an understatement. On-set, Fox knows what she wants to try on — and even more what she doesn’t. She diligently examines every look FASHION stylist Ashley Galang has pulled and has a strong opinion about all of them, pushing most of the bigger labels to the side in favour of smaller, independent ones.
It appears that for Fox, fashion is a way of regaining control of her image and reclaiming the narrative she once lost. In one interview sound bite turned viral TikTok audio, she shares that she doesn’t dress for the male gaze anymore but for “the girls and the gays.” And based on the aggressive online reaction her looks elicit from straight men, who can blame her? “I hope that women know that men are our biggest threats,” Fox declares very nonchalantly. “They think they own our beauty and can decide who’s pretty and who’s not. But what the f*ck do they do for us? After I had my son, I realized I don’t need a man anymore. I did it — I had a kid. Now I can go be me and dress for me because I don’t need a man to ‘like me’ anymore.”
Top, $535, Puppets and Puppets. Pants, $595, Re-Pull. Shoes, $1,170, Pīferi. Ring (left), $1,750, and ring (right), $2,545, John Hardy.
Top, $280, and shorts, $280, Rotate. Bra, $345, Re-Pull. Tights, $75, Wolford. Shoes, $810, Sebastian Milano.
Dress, $805, Puppets and Puppets. Shoes, $590, Maile. Headpiece, $250, Malakai.
Sculpture photography By Daniel Kukla, courtesy of Friedman Benda and Misha Kahn.
Fox’s indifference to men on the whole is one of the things her fans love the most about her. When she took a lie detector test for Vanity Fair, she hilariously got caught lying about not hating men, which she took in stride. Similarly, on Ziwe, she revelled in the host’s purposefully shocking questions and gave even more shocking answers, particularly when she was asked if she’s pro women killing men: “If the men deserve it, then yeah. Men kill women all the time for no reason.” Still, Fox rejects the title “radical feminist” and reinforces that she’s just “stating facts.” After weeks of defending herself as being the real author of her book and not resorting to using a ghostwriter, she’s more certain than ever that society underestimates women. “The game is rigged,” she says. “Even when you win, men will say it’s luck. But I think that’s why women kill it all the time — there’s no room for failure.”
That said, Fox recognizes that men are also victims of the patriarchy — just victims that benefit. “Having a little boy and seeing how sweet and gentle he is makes me really worried about what the world is going to do to him and that he’s going to come out an asshole,” she says. So, one thing she’s really concentrating on is creating a safe environment for him at home to cocoon him from the influence of toxic masculinity. “He loves my clothes. He loves my makeup. He loves my music, friends and partying — he’s a little mini me.” And it’s because of Valentino that sustainability has become such a priority for her — hence OMG Fashun.
Also on the horizon? Presence, a Steven Soderbergh thriller with Lucy Liu. And Fox is in the midst of casting a movie that she wrote—“I got my dream star to be in it!”— and developing Down the Drain into a miniseries, which includes the difficult task of casting herself. She’s open to finding someone more unknown for the role. “I think I want to go to all the public schools in New York and hold auditions there,” she says.
In the meantime, Fox has finished her skincare, loosened her fur coat and stopped vaping. As I walk with her to the hair and makeup chair for her photo-shoot prep, we chat casually about ghosts and psychics. Fox goes as far as to ask me to send her the contact of my roommate’s 80-year-old clairvoyant. (Apparently she’s looking for a new one.) But that’s just Julia Fox for you. She’s gritty and grounded yet ethereal and sometimes otherworldly — traits she hopes to continue exploring through writing fiction books and more scripts. “Ultimately, I just want to create worlds that I — and other people — can get lost in,” she says. Count us in.
