Chlöe Bailey: “True empowerment is knowing you can fight another day”

As a former child star, Chlöe is often assumed to be the product of a particularly controlling team behind the scenes orchestrating her career. In fact, almost everything comes directly from her. “I write my music, I produce my music; I produced and designed almost everything my sister and I made,” she says. “Very few people know that. But I'm not just a beauty; I have sense too. My favorite subjects in school were math and science and technology.”

What is impressive is that she acquired her skills self-taught. “I learned to play the piano by looking online to see what chords were what and how to play certain chords,” she says. “I taught myself how to use music production software and literally looked up producers and engineers online to see how they did things.”

Knowing the hard work she has put in gives her the confidence to stay true to herself. “I'm pretty stubborn and vocal when it comes to my music and I don't back down,” she says. “Everything you saw and heard from me was exactly what I wanted to do. And you know, of course I definitely listen to people's opinions and because I'm still young and I never think that learning and developing is a bad thing. But you have to trust your inner voice.”

She also remembers this when she feels impostor syndrome. “Do I ever?” Naturally. But I think it's starting to wear off because I realize, “Hey, your hard work got you here, so you have every right to be here in this room.” And I think we have to remember when whenever imposter syndrome starts to sneak up on us.”

She's learned to cultivate other areas of her life outside of her work, which helps her keep her celebrity status — and the good and bad sides of it — in perspective. She spends her free time playing Lego (which she finds “therapeutic”) and spending time with her friends and family. “My circle is really small – my godmother, my godbrother, my sisters,” she says. She and Halle remain extremely close and collaborated on a song: Do you want me?on Chlöe's album. “We both have different, very busy lives, so it was nice that we could be in one place at the same time and do this together,” she says. “She just killed it.”