Heart Evangelista on being in touch with her creativity, reinventing herself, and embracing flaws as a freeing act

Through it all, the actress continued to challenge expectations, swiftly gliding across genres from dramas and thrillers to romantic comedies. This seemed to crescendo in her late 20s when she underwent some significant changes in her career. “As you get older, you start to feel less constrained. You feel that you’re also, in a sense, living a lie because perfection is truly not of this world,” Heart relays. “I started to tap back into painting, and kind of revisited who I really am.” 

The world got to know Love Marie—her real name—as it branded each one of her paintings and sold-out solo exhibitions at the Ayala Museum, Galerie Joaquin, and Singapore’s Chan Hampe Galleries. Plus, who could forget her famously hand-painted Birkin bags? By etching her distinct touch on pieces she has long collected, Heart successfully weaved two of her great loves: art and fashion. Avowedly a fan of writing in her spare time, she, too, authored a book entitled This is Me, Love Marie in 2015. 

You could say it came as no surprise that, a few years later, she would make headlines for another outlet of expression: when she attended her first Fashion Week in 2017, upon the invitation of distinguished houses like Schiaparelli, Elie Saab, and more. Quickly becoming a front-row fixture at the industry event, and once notably dubbed by author Kevin Kwan as one of ‘The Real Crazy Rich Asians’ in a Harper’s Bazaar feature, the multi-hyphenate cinched her status as an international style icon. 

Read more: 11 moments from Heart Evangelista's Paris Fashion Week: Looks we love

“I express myself more creatively,” she condenses. “When I’m working, it’s still kind of the same because I love to dress up and collaborate with my team to put stuff together. In a sense, I'm still getting my creative juices flowing.” When the dust settles after each Fashion Week and jaunt around the globe, Heart enjoys more mellow pursuits. She paints, writes, and has recently begun playing the piano again. She nourishes the artist that she is to her core. 

There is certainly a sense of freedom that rules the star these days; no longer tied down by inhibitions of the industry nor the public eye, the Heart we see in the spotlight is as close as ever to her authentic, most genuine self. “When you’ve gone through something over and over, your immunity towards a certain situation really toughens up and it makes you feel like you’re bulletproof—that’s when I feel most empowered,” she says. “Like these days. I feel like, no matter what's thrown at me, I’ll be okay.”

Over the years, she’s also been practising the act of being kinder to herself and embracing her flaws for what truly they are: her power. “As soon as you find comfort and confidence in your imperfections, slowly but surely you will see how much you bloom and shine by just being confident in yourself,” she beams. “The way you stand, the way you speak, even the way you just wear a jacket, it totally changes.” Heart, no doubt, stands as the perfect example. 

Audiences now get to witness her charm, candour, and infectious confidence on her YouTube channel, where she recently launched a new vlog series titled, I am Heart. Shot and edited documentary-style, it follows the star and her inner circle along eventful trips to various fashion hubs, projects around the metro, and precious downtime spent with the family. “Life has been very good lately,” she notably says in the trailer, “and I feel like I'm in a really good headspace, which is priceless.” 

During our conversation, I once again broach the idea of breaking free—to which, she muses, “I feel it's just laying your cards down, all of it, the good and the bad, with those who you trust the most and those who will love you for who you truly are. And at the end of day, when sometimes you go through a phase that you don’t feel like anybody’s there for you, it’s really yourself that really just gets you out of a certain black hole. And because I owe it to myself, I feel like I should mentally, physically, and spiritually take care of myself. It all goes back to what’s inside.”

See also: How I learned to prioritise myself again: a journey to self-care

Heart keeps a host of self-care regimens to cultivate this inner strength. Amid her hectic schedule, she sticks to a dedicated fitness routine, a healthy diet, and a handful of tried-and-tested beauty treatments. One such non-negotiable is Ultherapy®, a non-invasive skin lifting treatment that she first discovered at the Aivee Clinic a while back. The jetsetter says, “I’ve been going to Dr Aivee [Teo] since I was 21, and she would always introduce me to different machines. Ultherapy® stood out because it was something that I just needed to do at least once a year.”

Gracing its latest campaign, which is fittingly dubbed ‘The Power of U’, Heart sends out her message of authenticity and self-love across a global audience. Her words of advice are likewise timeless. “Prioritise yourself,” she puts simply. “It’s not selfish to put yourself first. Because if you do so, you can deal with anybody and anything that comes your way. So make sure that you nourish yourself—your soul, your mind, and your body—and it will give back what is deserved.”

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