KYLIE'S
WORLD
T H E
B I L L I O
J E N N
W
M O T H E R , I N F L U E N C E R A N D A L M O S T -
N A I R E T A L K S T O H E R S I S T E R K E N D A L L
E R A B O U T W O R K , M O T H E R H O O D A N D
H A T M A T T E R S T O H E R T H E M O S T .
B Y R E M Y R I P P O N
P H O T O G R A P H Y B Y J A C K I E N I C K E R S O N
S T Y L I N G B Y C H R I S T I N E C E N T E N E R A
Kylie Jenner could click her fingers and have just
about anything she wanted in the world – but on a
Friday afternoon in one of the many cellular dead
zones of Los Angeles, mobile phone reception
doesn’t fall into that category. The 21-year-old is
genuinely apologetic when she eventually connects
with her older sister and today’s interviewer, Kendall,
five and a half hours later than the scheduled
interview time.
Jenner is phoning from the bedroom of the LA home
she shares with her boyfriend, 26-year-old rapper
Travis Scott, whom she met at last year’s Coachella
music festival (which Scott was headlining), and their
seven-month-old daughter, Stormi Webster. The last
time she went off the grid – posting sporadically to her
social channels and sidestepping public appearances
– was during her pregnancy. No Demi-Moore-on-
Vanity-Fair-style pregnancy shoots, and remarkably,
not even a cryptic drip-feeding of pregnancy-related
vox pops via Keeping Up With The Kardashians. She
did what many in her position would have thought
unthinkable, if not impossible – Jenner simply shut out
fame for a while.
Days after the arrival of her healthy baby girl on the
first day of February, she reconnected with her 112
million Instagram followers explaining her brief hiatus:
“I understand you’re used to me bringing you along on
all my journeys. My pregnancy was one I chose not to
do in front of the world. I knew for myself I needed to
prepare for this role of a lifetime in the most positive,
stress-free and healthy way I knew how.”
Whether intentionally or not, it marked a pivot point: a
time-stamped divide between Kylie, the youngest of
one of the world’s most recognisable families, and a
sort of coming-of-age Kylie: mother, tastemaker and,
thanks to the runaway success of Kylie Cosmetics,
one hell of a beauty pioneer. In under three years, her
make-up line has raked in sales of more than $630
million (she owns it outright, too), and according to
Forbes, she’s positioned to knock Mark Zuckerberg
off the youngest self-made billionaire. Not bad for
someone who has only just reached the legal drinking
age in her home state and is often unceremoniously
anointed with the ‘famous for being famous’ tagline.
Jenner is a force, whichever way you dice it.
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