Okgrl Archives | Wonderland

GIRLI

Wonderland Staff — Wed, 02 Mar 2016 11:55:56 +0000

Meet the irritating-on-purpose pink princess, hurtling tampons at her fans and dividing opinion like a jar of Marmite.

Taken from the Fame Issue of Wonderland.

“The first time we met, I was trying to sneak you into the Wonderland party,” I remind GIRLI, real name Milly Toomey, over the phone while I’m distracting her from her English A-Level homework. “That was jokes,” she half-groans. In my memory, the then 17-year-old singer was wearing a huge fur coat — all bubblegum-braided hair and fuchsia-pencilled eyebrows. It was a free bar and my memory’s a blur: she could have been wearing anything, as long as it was her trademark pink. I didn’t get her into the party I’m ashamed to say, but hours later, Toomey had crept past the bouncers, a flash of colour on the dancefloor.

“I hate being 18,” she sighs from her bedroom, which, I’m assured, is a pink palace. “Suddenly everything’s allowed. I think you lose the excitement of knowing that you’re not meant to be drinking, knowing you’re not meant to be in a club and sneaking in.”The north- west Londoner is finding mischief in plenty of other places, though. Toomey’s been compared to Lily Allen, the PC Music girls, Lady Sovereign and Baby Spice. But really, she’s like a Powerpuff Girl who’s munched a multipack of ProPlus.

Back in May, she released her debut track onto an unprepared Internet. “So You Think You Can Fuck With Me Do Ya?” is an erratic, hyper-feminine sonic assault, sampling everything from Mario-Kart sound effects to iMessage text tones.“Hey! You thought I was going to do a ballad? Fuck off. Never, ever, ever, ever, ever,” Toomey spits.

“That was just one of the first songs I wrote as GIRLI,” she remembers. “I was feeling pretty pissed off and I thought it was important to make people aware that women can be angry and in a legit way. Not just in a cat-fight screaming way… I write pop music… I think pop music at the moment is very middle-of-the-road and doesn’t really garner many extreme reactions. I wanted extreme reactions.”

While GIRLI might be the kind of kid to laugh in your face if you told her you didn’t like her, Toomey’s a touch more unassuming. On paper, a girl in a Barbie pink adidas tracksuit throwing tampons at her fans might hint at art-school pretension, but it acts as a front for a teenager trying to make it big in an unforgiving industry. “I’d say GIRLI is just me with a name that I think sounds cooler than Milly,” Toomey laughs with a dry rasp. “It definitely gives me a front to be a little bit more crazy and fearless. In real life, I am shy a little bit and I’m a little bit human. When I go on stage, I lose all fear because I think, ‘It’s just GIRLI. I can go back to being Milly at any time.’ People judge GIRLI, they don’t judge me… not so I have something to hide behind, but have a protective shield. It makes me feel a bit more like I can play a character if I want to, if I feel like Milly’s a bit too shy for that.”

Live, expect to witness Toomey and her comrade DJ Kitty in full-blown pop-brat mode. They’ll no doubt be donned in Buffalo platforms and lingerie, occasionally handing out condoms after the show with hand-written messages. Better safe than sorry. “I don’t know,” Toomey wonders when I probe about the tampon obsession. “I wanted to take something that’s a staple thing that every woman uses, that’s clearly an image of being a woman, and just make it less taboo — [to] make it this playful thing. I remember reading something about a Lily Allen song [in which she says the word] ‘period’. Radio 1 wouldn’t play her. I remember thinking, ‘That’s so bullshit, are we scared of periods or something? I’m just going to start throwing tampons at people.’ I think my favourite reactions are from the guys. I did a show in Leeds and then I threw them all out, then this old guy came up to me and was like, ‘Is it heavy-flow?’ That was just brilliant.”

Already been to a GIRLI show? You’ve heard “ASBOys” then, Toomey’s second single that starts like an M.I.A.-esque call to arms. Think war-beat drums and harmonised off-key chants, in which she comes for every London wasteman you’ve ever hated. It’s been four months since the track’s release, which means there’s new music on the horizon. “I’m so desperate to release everything at once, but I’ve been told that’s not a good idea,” Toomey sighs. I’ve been promised a single and an EP in the near future, but when I press for more details, the singer exclaims: “Oh, fuck! I need a title!”

She’s been busy in those four months though, taking part in Louby McLoughlin’s project OKgrl, a cyber-stylised fashion and music platform, and stylist Kylie Griffith’s GRL PWR — a female-only arts collective. And don’t forget about GIRLI.fm, Toomey’s hectic spoof radio show that she hosted from her “mum’s wardrobe” and includes (faked) interviews with Britney, the Spice Girls and Skepta. “I did it with my friend and collaborator Ian Watt,” she explains of the film and songs rips she used to compile her “conversations”. “We’re probably going to get sued mega!” “If you ever get a week free, you should make another one,” I enthuse.Toomey agrees, but between shopping for pink, recording her next (hopefully) polarising track and stocking up on a lifetime’s supply of tampons, I think she just might not have time.

GIRLI wears vintage VERSUS pink cotton jacket from a selection at ROKIT VINTAGE and white cotton joggers by ASHISH

Photography: Megan Eagles

Fashion: Toni-Blaze Ibekwe

Make up: Anastasia Brovik using MAC COSMETICS

Hair: Shiori Takahashi at Streeters

Words: Lily Walker

With thanks to God’s Own Junkyard

The post GIRLI appeared first on Wonderland.

OKgrl is here!

Wonderland Staff — Thu, 21 Jan 2016 10:51:04 +0000

Louby McLoughlin and DVTK have united to create the digital platform of your teenage dreams.

Queen of cute and all thing girlish, stylist Louby McLoughlin has teamed up with the ex digital directors of Kenzo, DVTK to bring you a new hyper feminine, cyber stylised digital platform – OKgrl. Technophobes, don’t turn off, although this is about the most 2016 version of a magazine you could get, this is still primarily about fashion, fun and our favourite thing, pop culture.

The word on the brain for the team was interaction, explains Louby, “We wanted to create a fashion platform which breaks the conventional publication rules by using interactivity, music and gamification, to match the entertainment levels the young generation already get from apps like Insta, Snapchat or Tumblr. We believed there was room for a higher end version of what the kids do at home in their bedrooms using the screen, something like a Tumblr Couture. For the launch we teamed up with some of the faces of the new pop era to realise this vision.”

Tumblr Couture? We’re hooked already. The site launches today with cover girls Hannah Diamond and Liz y2k and features include a whole host of new faces in pop QT, Kero Kero Bonito, Bip Ling and Girli.

Inspired by all your favourite teen girl mags (the kind that used to come with free glitter strawberry lipgloss, floppy haired boys as centrefolds and had song lyrics printed in the back pages) you can head over to the site now for the ultimate nostalgia trip.

We spoke to Louby herself about her cyber-venture…

How long has OKgrl been in the making? From the first idea to the launch, how long has it taken you?

I’ve actually been working on this for around 2 years, it took a while to get the right timing and for me to find the right people who also believed in the project.

Tell us about your cover girls! Why did you decide on Hannah and Liz?

Liz and Hannah are both stars of the internet, they are digital popstars in a new era of music with their own followings so it made it an easy choice for us to have them as the cover girls.

What’s in it for the boys?

Their favourite artists, games and music they like.

What do you think makes OKgrl different to what’s already out there?

The design is really the main point of difference, it’s interactive, it’s funny, hopefully it’s entertaining. You can listen to the cover girls’ tracks as you view their cover which is a fun twist on digital vs. print, you can play and be involved in more projects than other online sites. I guess it’s us having a laugh because we aren’t afraid to scare publishers or advertisers because we launched completely independent so we are making something for the reader to enjoy and that’s it.

What’s the obsession with teen girl mag covers (we’re in love, ultimate throwback)? Why did you want to revive that style?

Ha, I don’t know actually. Maybe it’s me wanting to be young forever. The teen magazine layout isn’t going to stay it was just for the launch.

How are we going to be able to interact with the QT editorial?

Come to the site and see!

How did you come to work with DVTK?

We met through a different project and we began talking about OKgrl, a project I had already realised the concept for and with collaborators we had produced a lot of the content but I decided I wanted to work with them on the execution because their ideas were next level and they were working with Kenzo before, a brand which continuously pushes things forward with tech and fashion, so nobody else could have done the job.

What are you most excited to reveal to everyone with the launch?

Probably the design, and the fact it looks expensive and we made it without investment and advert free. There is also a big difference in the layout of the mobile site and the desktop site.

How does OKgrl work, is it on an issue basis, when can we expect the next?

This was an ‘issue launch’ as a concept but from here on we will have project by project take over the site.

Who is OKgrl for?

Probably the younger audience who spend a lot of their time online and don’t buy print from newsstands.

OKgrl launches online today. Visit the site here.

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