Ashley Tisdale’s New Blog Promotes the Girl Boss Agenda
Tisdale gettin’ things done. Photo: Elias Tahan
Ashley Tisdale, the actress, producer, and singer best known for her roles in all three of Disney’s High School Musicals and TBS’s comedy series Clipped, is now trying her hand at yet another career: Editor-in-chief of her brand new blog.
On Wednesday, the 30-year-old Jill-of-all-trades launches The Haute Mess (pronounced ‘Hot Mess’), a lifestyle website dedicated to empowering young women, while helping them navigate through their sometimes sticky and occasionally painfully awkward 20s and 30s.
But GOOP Jr., this is not. To mix up the age-old blonde-actress-turns-lifestyle-guru format, Tisdale is set on making THM a platform for up-and-coming bloggers, or ‘content creators,’ to share their work and ideas, all while growing their own readerships.
“It’s not just me blogging,” Tisdale told Yahoo Style over the phone from Los Angeles on Tuesday. “I’ll have some stuff, but it’s really about a lot of content creators who are already out there and already have blogs, but who don’t have either the audience or the platform. So this is kind of sharing what they have, and being a whole community of women trying to figure things out.”
Tisdale’s new ‘do. Photo: @ashleytisdale/Instagram
In a way, The Tiz is using her famous name to help further the careers of other talented ladies who need a boost. “I have friends who do their own blogs, and it’s nice to be able to help support and promote them, as well,” she explained. “So it’s something that’s like, you’re not in competition, you’re just sharing and supporting.” Currently, THM will be posting pieces from about 25 contributors.
Her level of celebrity also grants Tisdale access to certain people and brands that other bloggers can’t necessarily get. “My colorist Kristin Ess just dyed my hair a completely different color [”strawberry bronde,” for those who missed it], so I was like, ‘Oh my god, let’s do an interview with you—we could put it on The Haute Mess!’ And it was really funny because, once we colored it, there were so many people who were trying to get interviews with her, and she’s just like, ‘No, Ashley’s got the exclusive!’ Which was, like, the coolest thing ever.” Recently, she attended makeup artist Mario Dedivanovic’s four-hour long beauty Master Class with Kim Kardashian, and promises to post about the tips she picked up. “I took, like, four pages of notes,” she laughed.
Another part of THM’s mission is to promote a modern and accessible, DIY-version of feminism. “A big part of it is being a girl boss. I run a production company, I act, I do a lot of stuff… but I like the idea of inspiring other women to just kind of be their own girl boss, and go out and do what you want to do.”
She continued, “I’m someone who likes to just get stuff done myself. I obviously have tons of awesome help with things, and I have the connections, I have a hair and makeup team when I need it, I have all this stuff. But at the end of the day, there’s nothing more rewarding than actually going at what you want to do and just getting there and doing it yourself.”
Mario Dedivanovic, Kim Kardashian, and Tisdale. Photo: @ashleytisdale/Instagram
As for how she arrived at the name ‘Haute Mess?’ Tisdale, who married musician Christopher French last fall, says the double entendre (’haute’ meaning ‘fashionable or high class’) stems from a very personal place: Learning to love and embrace her own imperfections.
“Over the years and in every stage of my life, when I was single and dating to now being married, I’ve always felt like, at points, I’m just a hot mess,” she told YS. “I remember saying to my husband when we first started dating, ‘Oh my god, I am such a hot mess right now; I can’t wait for you to see me at my best.’ But he loved me for it anyway, and that’s what it’s all about: Embracing the ‘haute mess’ inside you. I think I’ve struggled with always trying to be perfect, and you don’t always have to be. That’s probably the best thing about people—when people love you for who you are, even when you’re a mess part of the time.”
As Tisdale sees it, it’s that concept of celebrating and accepting one’s flaws that separates The Haute Mess from the billions of sites already crowding the landscape. “I think all these blogs are trying to be like, get the perfect hair and the perfect outfit; everyone just want to be perfect… But this is about embracing the haute mess inside all of us, and trying to figure it out together.”
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