Mannequin Princess Gollum on sun shades, identification and her on-line alias

Virtually each time Princess Gollum leaves her house, she’s shielded from the skin world by her favourite Rick Owens Hollywood Kriester lenses. Whether or not she’s taking a enterprise assembly or working errands, the multi-hyphenate mannequin prefers to maneuver by means of the town like “a rock star in hiding,” with the goggle-like shades dominating the vast majority of her face.

“I’m very free to look anyplace I need and never need to make eye contact,” she says. “I can get form of shy exterior, however [with these shades], I role-play nearly.”

She’s all the time gravitated towards funky-shaped and oversize frames. This pull towards the ultra-modern and eclectic aligns with how Princess Gollum presents herself on-line. With piercing eyes, an ever-changing haircut (teensy microbangs, a quasi-skullet, dip-dyed wigs) and a largely black avant-garde wardrobe, she comes off as an otherworldly, experimental siren.

Princess Gollum is Josephine Lee’s web alias. She created it when she was 23 years outdated (she’s now 33) as a option to bridge the hole between two reverse ends of her identification: her princess-like tendencies and her “darker, extra difficult” aspect.

“It captures two elements of me that I had a extremely laborious time making into an entire,” she says. “It’s my try to form of merge each of these personalities collectively and make peace with each of them in a enjoyable, visible means.”

It’s not that she lives her day-to-day life as this on-line moniker, however the title permits her to freely specific a extra excessive extension of her persona. It’s why she felt liberated to create the fake world of Gollum Corp Enterprises, for which she poses in company workplaces with pushpins tacked into her acrylics and jams a ruler and scissors into her updo. It’s why she will be able to unabashedly pose carrying fangs or Hiya Kitty face paint on her Instagram grid. But it surely’s additionally how she presents on the planet of modeling, hooked as much as wires, contorting her physique to emulate a snake and sprawled throughout a hospital mattress. Her spirit stays darkish, but whimsical — captured by means of the way in which she friends right into a digicam’s lens or the way in which she artfully tilts her head.

Monsoori over skirt, Fendi belt as prime and heels from Rocotito Archives, and sun shades by JiaHao Peng

“I nonetheless gown like myself, however now I do know what I like. I wish to experiment inside these bounds. It’s simply not as experimental because it was once,” says the mannequin.

Past modeling and sustaining a web-based following, the Princess Gollum ethos has acted as a car for her “slasher” way of life, which means she has her arms in lots of inventive pots. Over time, she’s labored as a DJ, jewellery maker (underneath her model Spit Snot) and a visible artist, dealing largely with multimedia initiatives. Up till not too long ago, she put full-time modeling on maintain to give attention to Blip, a nicotine alternative model she co-founded.

“I transfer by means of life very organically. I’m not a lot of a future planner,” she says by means of a Zoom name on an unusually gloomy summer season afternoon. She wears a black, rhinestoned Kuromi tee together with her blue contacts, providing a pop of colour in her white-walled condominium. “This new setup has given me a greater steadiness of all the pieces. I nonetheless am in survival mode, however my mindset has modified. What fuels me is the wish to make the very best factor, and now I’m not chaotically making an attempt to do all the pieces anymore.”

On this new vein of life, she feels her model evolving. Throughout her 20s, Princess Gollum remembers going all out and pushing each look to its limits, from her well being goth section to rocking a mohawk. She doesn’t remorse any of it — apart from dyeing her hair orange, she confesses. These days, she finds herself taking dangers on a a lot smaller scale.

Monsoori sleeve as gown, Chanel hen cage bag pre-fall 2020 from SPR, heels from Rocotito Archives, Dieabaddie from indietoy.

Marc Jacobs for Louis Vuitton the New Age Traveller Spring/Summer time 2010 bag from Pechuga Classic, Vivienne Westwood Spring 2009 heels from Pechuga Classic, and Mogols charms from indietoy.

“I nonetheless gown like myself, however now I do know what I like. I wish to experiment inside these bounds. It’s simply not as experimental because it was once.” She remembers having a candid dialog with a buddy not too long ago the place she posed the query: “Do I gown boring now?”

However no, Princess Gollum doesn’t assume “boring” is the suitable phrase. She thinks “refined” and “snug” are a greater match. If something, this newfound model has allowed her to decorate with ease, together with on the subject of eyewear.

“Within the final 10 years, I’ve actually discovered what’s going to suit my face, and I fall in love quick,” she says. Proper now, her assortment largely consists of ‘90s Moschino, Oakleys (for her “primary” wants) and uncommon classic finds. At any time when she’s on the hunt for a brand new pair, her first cease is the Rose Bowl Flea Market the place she finds Allyn Scura, an area vendor, who customizes classic frames. Out of all of the pairs she’s bought from Scura, Princess Gollum treasures her customized, bat-winged prescription pair probably the most.

To Princess Gollum, sun shades are the ultimate contact that may make or break an outfit all whereas functioning as a key piece of armor. In hiding her eyes behind these immense lenses, she fights off undesirable power exchanges and unsolicited stares. She finds her most treacherous battleground to be none aside from luxurious grocer Erewhon. “Everyone seems to be all the time simply checking one another out. However I’m shy. I simply wish to get my smoothie and go.”

Diesel jacket skirt and bag, Azalea Wang sneakers, Versace sun shades from Rocotito Archives, Conzai charms from indietoy, and nails by Carolyn Orellana.

“It captures two elements of me that I had a extremely laborious time making into an entire,” Princess Gollum says. “It’s my try to form of merge each of these personalities collectively and make peace with each of them in a enjoyable, visible means.”

Rising up in numerous Los Angeles and Orange County neighborhoods, Princess Gollum has encountered every kind of sun shades wearers. There was that one actually cool woman in highschool who wore Ray Ban Wayfarers and carried a Chloé purse. There have been the athletes who wore their Oakleys religiously. And as she began to bask in elements of L.A.’s nightlife, she seen how many individuals saved their glasses on all night time. To her, there’s just one occasion the place nighttime frames will be acceptable.

“It’s solely OK throughout a bender or while you’re means too wasted and also you don’t wish to get caught. And also you’re stumbling round at CVS in search of a hangover remedy earlier than you go house.”

She begins to snicker about these messy moments the place sun shades aren’t a luxurious, however quite a necessity. On this flash of shared laughter, it turns into clear what each sun shades and the net moniker supply to the artist. They offer her the room to decide, whether or not she’s defending herself from obtrusive strangers on the road or the net lots.

Princess Gollum will select when she desires to share her cutting-edge outfits with the world or preserve them to herself. Some mornings she’ll neglect her colour contacts and rock her pure brown eyes. She’ll determine which inventive shoots to be part of and preserve her future objectives near her chest. Even then, she’ll decide when’s the suitable time to be caught underneath the fluorescent CVS lighting, darkish shades totally intact.

Justin Moreno prime and skirt, Chanel Spring 1994 sneakers from Rocotito Archives