I try not to be judgmental about North West, but I’ll always judge her parents for pushing her out there when she was just a kid. It’s not just that North was photographed constantly since birth – plenty of “celebrity kids” have had that same experience and turned out normal-ish. My issue is that Kim Kardashian and Kanye West don’t seem to realize that North is simply too young to have a music career, a fashion career, and an on-stage persona. That child is 13 years old. Let her be a kid, and even more than that, let her go through her awkward puberty phase without the world watching. Alas, North West covers the latest issue of Dazed. The interview was… something. The Dazed writer did note that Kim was in the room the entire time for the interview, so at least that’s one good thing. Some highlights from the interview:
Her debut EP, N0rth4evr: Released in May, N0rth4evr is a six-track mosh pit of rage rap, emo, hyperpop, alt rock and metal, sampling everything from Meg & Dia’s “Monster” to Kikuo’s “Love Me, Love Me, Love Me”. Maximalist production, buzzing synthesisers and jolts of electric guitar run through the record, while her signature Japanese tag, “ ノースちゃん (North-chan)”, announces one thumping club beat after another.
All North wants is piercings and Manic Panic dye: “Everyone’s in love with boys, vaping and doing all kinds of bad stuff. All I want is blue hair and piercings.”
Her current obsession: “Rehearsing every day. I used not to rehearse. I used to want to go out there and just see what happens. But I like dance rehearsing.
Her ideal day: “I don’t know… I don’t like to rest a lot. I like to get stuff done. So maybe just going to rehearsal, and then going to the studio; that’s a perfect day. Or having a big show would be the most ideal day.”
Worst piece of advice: “To start my career later. It’s like, nah, this is my hobby, this is what I like to do, this is what I wanna do with my life.
What she loves about piercings: “They just make you your full self. I really want to get my bridge pierced, but I’m not allowed.
Her most-used apps: “I be using TikTok and Pinterest. I like to make moodboards for my nails and my hair. But also I just be making it up; I gotta draw it too, ’cause there’s nothing on Pinterest. I can’t find what I really want for real.”
What she would do if she wasn’t an artist: “What would I be? I still wanna work. I wanna work at, like, Starbucks next year. I think I can next year ’cause I’m gonna be 14, so… I think I can. I want to have a regular job, I guess.
I don’t know if there’s a word or concept for what I’m about to describe, but it’s like North’s parents have never told her that her dreams and desires at 13 are not going to be her dreams and desires at 18, 21, 25 or 30. No one has told her “no,” no one has told “this is just a tween/teen phase, babe.” Her parents have adultified her to this point. The Starbucks thing is telling too – somewhere, she knows her world of extremes isn’t actually real, and she craves normal-teen stuff, like working at her first job. Another element to this is North’s father, who treats her like the only one of his kids that he really cares about. Like, that’s a whole other psychological issue at play.
Photos courtesy of Backgrid, cover courtesy of Dazed.
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- Paris, FRANCE North West is seen leaving a fashion show as crowds of fans and photographers gather outside the venue in Paris. Pictured: North West BACKGRID USA 26 JUNE 2026 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Paris, FRANCE North West made an appearance at the Vetements fashion show during Paris Fashion Week, drawing a large crowd of fans. Pictured: North West BACKGRID USA 26 JUNE 2026 BYLINE MUST READ: DPTIG / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Paris, FRANCE North West is seen leaving a fashion show as crowds of fans and photographers gather outside the venue in Paris. Pictured: North West BACKGRID USA 26 JUNE 2026 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Paris, FRANCE North West is seen leaving a fashion show as crowds of fans and photographers gather outside the venue in Paris. Pictured: North West BACKGRID USA 26 JUNE 2026 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
Is this kid even in school? I can’t believe she is only 13, she looks 30.
There seems to be no mention of school whatsoever
Yeah, I would have liked a question about school. Wouldn’t that be a normal question for a 13yo? I hope she gets her job at Starbucks, I really do. I remember reading an interview with Lisa Marie years ago in which she said that in high school, she’d gotten herself a job at the local burger place but when her mom found out she made hit quit. You’re Elvis’ daughter! You’ll be swarmed with photographers! NO!!!! Lisa Marie had been so proud of herself & her mom wrecked it.
Good luck, North-chan.
No, she’s not in school. Kim says she is homeschooled with a curriculum designed specifically for her, which includes brand building — I’m not joking – and music production. Brand building was what she was studying at 12 years old this past school year. Another Kardashian creation in the making.
OMG, just on a basic level–vocabulary building, history, basic basic science and math–this kid is going to be functionally illiterate and ill-numerate. High school is when you have different teachers for different subjects because you’ve reached a point where field expertise is needed Kim alone cannot be homeschooling effectively. And plus, there’s peer group stuff that in the right school might be enormously mind-opening. Clubs, volunteering, etc.
This is way dramatic, but this approach to her education sounds like step one for a life long struggle with mental health.
Her brain is literally forming right now, it’s not too late to enroll her in a school and give her a chance at a good life.
Please tell me you are joking and this young girl isn’t being isolated from peers and going to a “jr high” with brand building.
Home schooled by who? She demonstrates little ability to construct sentences properly. What the hell does this ridiculous family have against education? Did her mother learn nothing from her skip college & law school and flunk the bar exam experience?
PUT THIS CHILD IN SCHOOL!
Homeschooling doesn’t mean it’s just the parents doing the teaching. With Kim’s resources she could have an entire staff of teachers on hand. I don’t like the negative comments saying that North is going to be illiterate because that is dangerously close to racist propaganda.
Saaaaame! Was just gonna say.
Im white. If i homeschooling my kids they would be illiterate.
I worry more about how individual needs are never going to addressed. Peer relations, learning problems, executive functioning
Then your problem is with homeschooling in general. And the things you mentioned — peer relations, learning problems, executive functioning — show that you have a very limited understanding of how homeschooling has evolved.
I home schooled two kids over the course of Covid. I found that there are people that are much better trained than I ever could be. I know my kids still suffer from the lack of social interaction and peer relations from that time.
I am sure there have been advancements since then, but I still feel that untrained parents are going to miss things, like my sons dyslexia, single sided deafness and autism. I live with him and got the ADHD.
“I be using TikTok and Pinterest.”
Not promising, but she could be trying to be edgy.
These two pathetic,narcissitic fools as parents should be investigated for child abuse.
I don’t want to talk about her look, but poor girl didn’t have a chance.
I don’t know why, but I think to other celebrity kids and some of them the Madonna’s kid, Michael Jackson kids, seemed much more shielded from fame and are more well adjusted.
Paris Jackson is hardly an example of a well-adjusted person. She’s had multiple problems growing up & adjusting to life. We don’t really know about her brothers. But I do see that as big & famous as Madonna & Michael Jackson are/were, we don’t know much about their offspring. Which is a good thing.
You had to be 16 for that kinda job in my day. I ran a babysitting business at 14, but that seems too young for a customer facing role. I cringe at how customers would treat a 14 year old.
Here, in Missouri, you can work at 14. Most jobs are at library McDonald’s or bus boys at different restaurants/ nursing homes. The most they do at McDonald’s is run food out or clean the tables. They can’t prep or cook food. They are restricted in hours they may work – less than 207 hours a week and must not work pastv7bpm. I know this because I have grandchildren who have worked there. Good for her to want to work a normal job but i don’t see it happening for many reasons.
And lifeguarding. A lot of my friends in high school did that.
I think it depends on the state laws but yes, 16 for that type of job here AND I’ve never seen a 16 year old working at Starbucks, they’re usually college age. Dunkin’ & McDonald’s hire the 16 year olds, as do retail stores, ice cream shops, the Y.
In the state I grew up in you could have a part time job at 15. But that was a long time ago, maybe it’s different now
I got a work permit at that age but you’re right, it’s changed in my state as well.
I can see a 14 year old being allowed to bus tables/wash dishes … but y’all know what I’m saying when it comes to customer facing roles. I feel that’s just too young for the creepiness factor.
Not to mention the older [potential] creeps working in the kitchen.
I’m in Massachusetts, students need a work permit, which they obtain from the school, to work at 14. A lot of my students work at grocery stores as baggers or cart fetchers… the girls often work at gymnastics/cheer places teaching the younger kids. I think Starbucks has to wait until 16 (that said, I would want to avoid that job, it seems stressful!!).
You can work a fair number of jobs at 14 in many states, though with highly restricted hours and responsibilities, obviously. I would think Starbucks likely requires most of its employees to be at least 16 and up, though, simply because of the equipment handling. Lot of places for potential burns in a kitchen.
She’s 13 going on 30 because people around her are yessifing her every thought and idea. To keep Kanye and Kim happy. I do think Kim knows where to draw the line. And Kanye is gonna Kanye.
She is just in the unique position to have everything she wants and it has no bounds. Example The Lion King at the Hollywood Bowl. She is a child so no comment on her performance and non Lion King costume.
Just hope Kim keeps her feet on the ground the best she can.
Kim doesn’t know where to draw the line at all. She is the one raising her, and she was put out there this whole past year at 12 as if she were 18 years old. She only turned 13 two months ago. She is another product for the Kardashian family. Kim is just as bad as Kanye in regards to this child.
Kim is not grounding her at all. The kid should be in school doing normal kid things not building her “career”
It’s so sad.
Even if she wanted to be a professional entertainer, she needs time to actually learn about music and become good at it before she/it are turned into a commodity.
Because she’s selling it so early, it won’t be like a refuge for her.
Probably but I have hope, I am an optimistic lol. She dresses modestly and Kim seems to stick to her when she is doing whatever she does. I am more worried about the lack of parenting skills of Kanye and his naked wife. When she was touring with him.
So what’s the kid going to do when her “hobbies” fail?
I think she may actually take the initiative to work at Starbucks. For her, I don’t think it’s a bad back-up plan, considering the Kardashians are too money-obsessed and somewhat insane.
My guess is she’s starting her “career” early to gain some degree of financial independence from Kim, because, um, no one wants to be watched 24/7 on a tv show.
yes, it’s fun to be poor when you are rich.
I don’t think she’s actually looking for the perceived”fun-ness” of being poor.
I simply think she’ll eventually want privacy and normalcy. Do I think she would work at Starbucks long-term? Heck no. But I think she may try to pursue a path like Kylie Jenner where she tries to make big bucks off of some product that doesn’t require her to be on television.
No one wants to be poor, but I don’t think most people want Kim’s life either. There’s a limit to how rich you need to be from being on television with no discernible talent. The first $100 million would be enough for me to call it a day and just invest.
She is overexposed already at 13! I cannot recall another celeb kid having this much media attention at such a young age. I do believe that the media is irresponsible for publishing stories about a child. My daughter is 13 and I cannot imagine her having this type of platform. It’s such a delicate age for self esteem and even though North seems self assured, it’s likely that she is masking some. There is just so much I disagree with. I want to raise my kids with awareness and accountability, two things she does not have.
The kid needs peers/teachers who aren’t on the payroll, counseling and to touch grass. She also needs to grow up outside her parents deranged, vapid media bubble and isolated, sad lives. Her mother is insane to allow her to be featured in the media like this. (Kanye is absent. He has no influence on the kiddos daily existence other than being a chaos agent. This mess is all Kim). Kim is setting her up to be mocked and isolated her entire life. She is also making the kid a target for deranged magat nutters who are already spreading vicious rumors and lies about the kid.
Fully agree Kim is insane for this. I doubt this magazine is doing this for anything other than bridge building to interview someone she’s connected to, or possibly at Kim’s suggestion (like architectural digest that you can buy a feature).
No one should be interviewing 13 year olds. At this point I don’t think anyone under 16 should be allowed in the entertainment business, for their own protection. Hayden and her cohorts that have all passed early are a pretty clear indication that unless you have amazing parents (like zendaya seems to have), it will kill you a few years down the road.
I give Kim credit for how she was publicly handling Kanye when he was crashing out, the kids seemed protected, but I don’t think she protected North enough. And now with this putting her out there like this, it looks like she’s trying to be a less gross version of her mom. I can see how she’d think she could do the managing and she’d skip the really gross exploitation, but it just means she’s doing smaller doses of the same thing.
If she wants to work at Starbucks, I’m pretty sure she’s going to rebel at some point against Kim.
I didn’t find her irritating in this. She’s only 13, so I wouldn’t actually expect her to be an interesting person. Even Natalie Portman, who had good parents and a good upbringing, wasn’t. Thirteen-year-olds are inherently boring to adults. I just found it telling that she’s aware that there’s a sense of normalcy out there, separate from what the Kardashians do, and maybe working at Starbucks can help her achieve it haha.
Maybe she’ll pull an Apple, go to university, and major in some law, society, and history major at university.
Apple is now working in the same industry as her mom. 🤷♀️
So I’m confused, are those real or fake piercings? If so who on earth lets their 13 year old get their face pierced???
My daughter is 16 and thinks eyebrow piercings are cool. I told her you can do what you want….when you’re 18.
@Normades, I came here to say the exact same thing. Maybe I am old-school, but my parents would NEVER allow me to do that at that age.
I had to Google “bridge piercing” to confirm what I thought it was. Grabbing my reading specs, the photos clearly show one on the upper bridge of North’s nose. So, unless that particular piercing is a fake, I don’t understand her statement that she wants one, but is not allowed to get it. I suppose I can G-search “fake piercings”, but I’ve reached my quota for useless web searches linked to anything Kardashian.
i think her facial piercings are fake, but the ones one her fingers are real? i think i read that somewhere, but i don’t remember.
It doesn’t sound like North goes to school and I’d be shocked if she doesn’t end up with an identity crisis.
She’s a kid. But her brand seems to be a painful caricature of what a kid should be. That I lay at the feet of all her handlers including her mother (Kanye is a deadbeat unless he needs a headline)
The piercings.
Charmed, I’m sure.
This is just so heartbreaking, and honestly it has to be some form of abuse.
Neglect comes in many forms.
Luckily, I won’t be the one having to deal with her at work. I don’t think children from wealthy families raised without boundaries are suitable for working in “normal” places. Why make life harder for ordinary people? Because you suddenly felt like it out of boredom?
Ugh, this poor child. Kim & Kanye really want to put her out there as some sort of prodigy, don’t they? I’m not saying she isn’t talented (I wouldn’t know, I’ve never listened to her music or seen her perform), and she seems to be passionate about it, but would it be so terrible for that talent to be nurtured and developed out of the spotlight? While also receiving a proper education? But I guess this route was inevitable and she never stood a chance at a normal, private childhood given who her family is.
If you listen to her words, she sounds EXACTLY like most of the 13 year old girls in my very ordinary suburban orbit. She’s doing just fine.
Yup, I work with kids that age as a teacher and she would be in one of the subcultures (anime, obsession with Japan), but within that subculture she sounds pretty normal and going through the same process of building her identity.
Thirteen-year-old girls in your orbit are not on the cover of a magazine or doing press or ***skipping school*** to study “brand-building.” She is not doing just fine at all.
Exactly.
Kim is turning into her own mother, pimping out her kid.
I don’t see this ending well.
Her blue hair is the most normal adolescent thing about her.
I can’t see how any child of Kim and Kanye stands a chance of any kind of normal life. Just hope she survives the monetization and chaos.
“I be using Tiktok and Pinterest…”
…Jesus wept.
Hahahahahahaha. Poor rich Northy. I’ll always be sad over her rich upbringing. It leads to nowhere, really
She reminds me of Will Smith’s kids. They are out there in the entertainment world but haven’t made a big splash and probably couldn’t live the lifestyle they want with the money they have made from their careers.
Leave Willow out of this! She’s my fave nepo baby – her music is legitimately interesting.
I hope she does get to work at Starbucks.
What is she worrying about laying tracks and studio sessions for at 13 years of age. She can still enjoy music away from all that pressure.
Lol at these comments criticizing her and calling her illiterate…nope, guarantee you that she’s more literate than England’s future queen and has more poise and self-assurance in her little finger than another 13yrd old future heir…
??? Not sure what this has to do with the royal family!?
People are questioning her literacy because of the way she speaks and the fact that she doesn’t go to school.
I feel really sad for this kid. I also wonder how much education she actually has since she’s “home schooled”.
Grant, in one of my college classes in New York City, Black English was a big topic. We studied it and putting the “be” before “using” shows over a long time period. Yes, there was a lot of conflict in the class about studying it, accepting it, rejecting it, etc. I don’t know where North would be hearing Black English (other Black musicians?), but I personally have no problem with it. As a New York City teacher, my thought is that Black kids, if they do use Black Engish, should know standard American English too, because in college and at jobs, they will need it. Black English has its own rules, which we studied in this linguistics class. And yes, it is stigmatized. I have no trouble listening to and understanding Black English. It has its own beauty, IMO.
Also, I think North is a very intelligent girl and will find her way eventually. There have got to be some good, normal people in her life who can guide her. Not her parents, of course.
Lastly, Black English is NOT illiteracy. Maybe it could be called a dialect (but it’s such a touchy subject, I’ll probably get in trouble for calling it that).