Glamour UK (April 2005)
It’s Gwen’s world (we all just live in it)
Bagging Brit awards, selling records by the bucket-load and generally being the über-coolest thing on the planet – it must be awful to be Gwen Stefani. In fact, professional glories aside, the past six months have been the trickiest of her life. But in a GLAMOUR exclusive she assures Sylvia Patterson that she – and her marriage – are stronger than ever.
“Oh my God,” gasps Gwen Stefani, clattering across the floor in Alexander McQueen heels. “I was gonna buy this place…”
As places go, it’s a corker. We’re high in the Hollywood hills, the view stretching across LA. This home is someone’s castle, on hire for GLAMOUR’S shoot, an enormous, French-style chateau, featuring Romeo And Juliet balconies, chandeliers and chaise lounges throughout. It’s two years old, built after a fire razed the original house to the ground. It was the original, naturally, that caught Gwen’s eye.
“It was from the “20s,” she says, settling down in the private cinema. “I came up here right after Tragic Kingdom [the 1995 No Doubt album that sold 15 million copies]. I was still living at home and didn’t have anything. But I’d just won the lottery, basically. Now I’m thinking I should’ve bought it, knocked it down and made a modern house. They’ve made it… [whispers] tacky.”
Nowadays, Gwen keeps winning the lottery over and over again. Her debut solo album Love Angel Music Baby is a globally acclaimed success, the “collaborative side project” (while No Doubt take a break) featuring an almost comically cool roll call: OutKast’s Andre 3000, Dr Dre, Eve and The Neptunes. Her street chic clothing line, Lamb (created in 2003 with LeSportsac CEO Timothy Schifter), now swings from the bodies of Cameron Diaz and Paris Hilton. She also appeared, albeit in a cameo, as Jean Harlow in the year’s most Oscar-nominated film, The Aviator, after being handpicked for the part by Martin Scorsese. Gwen describes the experience as “magical, all my life I’ve been drawn to old movie stars”. This is Gwen’s moment – the coolest woman in the world.
“Aaaw,” she splutters at this suggestion. “Isn’t it weird how it’s ill… fake’? Well, it’s weird how people are just ‘in’, or ‘out’.”
Strewn across a swivelling leather chair, Gwen is a homegirl vision in khaki combats, outsized green tracksuit top and a woolly green hat pulled tight over tumbling curls. Up close – hooray! – she looks exactly her 35 years; a phenomenally attractive woman with perfect set teeth and dark, brown eyes. An affable, “gee shucks” Californian, she’s simultaneously wary when subjects veer towards the personal. Since her marriage in September 2002 to Brit Gavin Rossdale – the handsome lead singer of rock band Bush – she’s been a global tabloid staple. Gwen met Gavin in 1996, when No Doubt toured with Bush. For years their relationship was long distance, occasionally splitting them up while their respective bands grew in stature.
“Having the creative life of being devoted to a band is intense,” notes Gwen, “so having a partner who is doing the same thing is a blessing. Someone who understands through all those years of living in different countries. Since we’ve been engaged [New Year's Day, 2002] we’ve really spent a lot of time together. We got married, and suddenly the band isn’t number one.”
GLAMOUR spoke to Gavin in autumn 2001, who said of their slow-burning relationship: “It’s only in the last year we’ve really started to concentrate on each other properly. And we’re on fire.” Gwen, said Gavin, was a mobile phone enthusiast prone to text sex, describing her style as “a bit of love and a bit of the hot stuff.”
“Really?” balks Gwen. “That’s probably too much information!”
They married in 2002, the bride in a Dior by John Galliano gown, in St Paul’s Church in London’s Covent Garden and then flew to LA for a vow renewal ceremony.
Gavin Rossdale, astrology watchers, is a Scorpio man with Scorpio rising, and Scorpio present in two more astrological houses. This makes him as sexually volcanic as it’s possible to be.
“Um… I wouldn’t know about that!” shrieks Gwen, head in hands. “I’ve only had two boyfriends in my life, y’know?”
If Gwen’s nervous about questions regarding Gavin, it’s no wonder: she’s had a tough six months. Gavin, as a teenager, was part of the Primrose Hill set – along with Sadie, Jude, Kate Moss and Pearl Lowe, partner of Supergrass drummer Danny Goffey. The clique are rarely out of the headlines, but last year it was Gwen who was caught in the middle of one of their dramas. Pearl has a 16-year-old daughter, Daisy Lowe (now a fledgling model), who she always claimed was fathered by a then boyfriend. However, during this relationship, she had an affair with Gavin Rossdale and, after a lifetime of ambiguity, decided to find out who Daisy’s real father was. Gavin, Daisy’s godfather, agreed to a DNA test and it proved positive. Since then there’s been a court case (no parties have disclosed details) and an abrupt end to their life-long friendship. Gwen, meanwhile, has spoken for years of her longing for children with Gavin. You couldn’t make this stuff up on Wisteria Lane. Gwen Stefani – the monogamous, two-boyfriends-in-a-lifetime Catholic girl – was reportedly devastated, but today she’s formidably loyal to Gavin.
“Well,” she says, eyes burning with discomfort, “I can’t speak about any of that.”
It seems she’s spoken about it already though, in the lyrics to Danger Zone, a song on her solo album: “Are your secrets where you left them?/Cause now your ghosts are mine as well/I think it’s time I met them and I think it’s time you tell.” “I would never say if it was [about that situation] or if it wasn’t,” says Gwen forcefully, “because people’s interpretation of a song is sometimes so much better than the initial interpretation was supposed to be.”
She’s running away fast, talking of the “magical” nature of lyrics, how they’re “like painting, blending colours together…”
Gwen, those lyrics are specific.
“Y’know, my first record with No Doubt was all about my love life,” she says, returning to earth, “and exposing myself in a very naive way. But I’ve learned it’s one thing to be going out with someone and be famous, but once you get married, to give up information, to actually want to share it – I have no desire to do that. I put my music out there to be judged – either shot down or embraced. But my marriage is my marriage and for anyone to have an opinion about it, they can fuck off. Because it has nothing to do with anyone but me and him.”
I recount a quote from Gavin, mere months before they got engaged: “The thing about Gwen is she is consummately amazing. You’d be hard pressed to find anyone who’s ever come across her who doesn’t find her genuine and amazing and warm and friendly. She would have a queue round the block if she were a single girl. She wouldn’t even have to be a single girl. Lucky me, I can’t believe it.”
“Oh my God,” says Gwen, visibly moved. “I’m gonna fucking cry.” She points to her eyes, brimming with tears.
“That’s crazy. He’s got a way with words, but… I’m crying. He has so many different sides to him, I’m always finding more. I think that’s why I love him, because it never ends.”
Gwen was born with no ambition. A middle-class, Catholic girl from Orange County, (The OC made flesh), she lived, happily, under the almighty shadow of her big brother Eric. A gifted artist and musician, he started No Doubt but left the band in 1994 and now works as an animator on The Simpsons.
In late 1986, aged 17, Gwen joined No Doubt as a backing singer, seeing “a great excuse to dress up”. She fell in love with bassist Tony Kanal, until their mid-’90s split, which proved the pivotal moment of her creative life. Now the lead singer and songwriter in the band, their hit single Don’t Speak – which was written about the split – became a global rock-pop classic from the Tragic Kingdom album. “Once I learned how to write songs,” says Gwen, “it was like I was a human. Before that I was just this girl.”
Gwen worked for years as a cleaner and a department store sales girl through her college degree in art. Descended from three generations of dressmakers, she was an accomplished seamstress aged ten. Gwen inhabits a visual world fuelled by fashion and actually cried the first time she saw a Galliano show. “I know it sounds geeky,” she laughs, “but it moved me.”
She believes in looking good physically – mostly through “vanity” – and makes a colossal effort to do so. She loathes the beautiful people who make none. “Oh I hate those people,” she froths. “I have to work out every fricking day. Five days a week on average.” She’s one of the few female celebrities who hasn’t had a boob job (she sees her minimal breasts as “cute little boobies”), but she doesn’t rule one out. “One day maybe… I don’t say ‘never’ about anything,” she grins.
Gwen’s experienced her share of heartache. In 1987, No Doubt bandmate John Spence committed suicide. Her break-up with Tony was painful. Last year, she lost her Scottish grandmother. And now her husband has discovered he has a 16-year-old daughter neither of them knew about.
“Life is hard sometimes,” Gwen nods. “But I had such an incredible childhood. My mom is just so loving; she’ll send me little cards and notes, and these things ground me through the hard times. But I can’t complain. I’ve got this incredible family, an incredible husband – I’ve got everything. I don’t mean to brag… but I have. I have been blessed.”
This coming year will be hectic for Gwen and Gavin. More singles from her album and a new album from him under the name Institute. Gwen’s currently designing the fifth Lamb collection and will stage her first catwalk show in New York this autumn. “Design is something I would love to do forever,” she says. Having spoken openly of her desire for a baby for years, today she’s far more cautious.
“My sister just had a baby.” Gwen smiles, cradling her Lamb satchel. “And he’s just the most stupidly gorgeous thing. But I don’t really feel like that’s what I want to do this second. I just want to enjoy this moment, because it’s all so quick and it won’t be like this forever. It’s pretty awesome, y’know? And new. So I’m taking one day at a time.”
Stefanis’s style stake-out
Gwen gives GLAMOUR the lowdown on some of her most memorable looks
Glastonbury, June 2002
“We were on the Rock Steady tour. The band really wanted to do the festivals and I was, ‘You know what? I’ve been to enough rough parties. I don’t want to do them any more.’ But I did it for them. I’m not a tent type. I used to be. For 12 years. But I’ve sold out. I’m a woman now.”
Golden Globes, January 2003
“I got slaughtered for that. They didn’t like me hair. The dress is vintage Valentino, I think it’s very chic. That night everybody - the stars or whatever - were so complimentary to me, I felt like the belle of the ball. And then the next day it’s [dorky voice] ‘Aw, Gwen Stefani looks like shit’ and I was, ‘Oh my god, you’re so mean!’ Of course it hurts. And then on a show this year they brought it up again: ‘You know, people gave her a hard time and she looked really incredible.’ So this year they decided I looked good last year. You have to be able to laugh.”
Night out in LA, January 2003
“I was out one night with my brother-in-law, my husband and some friends. I’m wearing a fake fur Miss Sixty jacket and my husband’s jeans.”
Universal Grammy Party, December 2004 [sic]
“Oh my God, you can see my nipples! You think I would want someone to see that!? That’s not me. That’s not my thing, dude. I made that dress in my kitchen, dyed it red and I think it turned out so pretty.”
The Aviator premiere, December 2004
“That’s a Vivienne Westwood. People liked that one. That night was weird because the scene that I play is in Mann’s Chinese Theatre where the premiere was. So we were sitting in the Mann’s Chinese Theatre, watching me on screen in Mann’s Chinese Theatre watching the original movie Jean Harlow was in. It was really cool.”