TikTok Star Madeline Argy Talks Thirst Traps, Public Relationships, and Nepo Babies

Madeline Argy’s first TikTok was a thirst trap. “I had a crush on this girl,” the 23-year-old admits in her southern England accent. Her logic? “I just need to figure out a way to have a small, little following and then she’ll love me.” So she set about telling amusing, mile-a-minute anecdotes to camera, until one—a jaw-dropper of a story about a worm in her sister’s leg—went viral (like, almost six million likes, stopped-in-the-street viral), changing her world completely. That “small, little following”? At last count, Argy has seven million social media followers.

The moment Argy found internet fame coincided with a burgeoning relationship with rapper Central Cee, sparking endless speculation about their partnership. “I didn’t really look to see what was going on,” she says of what the sudden interest in her personal life felt like. “Sometimes it’s best to just mind your business.” Now, however, with a seat on the front row at Valentino, Prada, and Versace, the spotlight shines on Madeline alone. “I always had someone with me at fashion week. [Going solo] was a very big push into feeling like I actually have a right to be there.”

After the first time I encountered Madeline Argy, I described her as “almost completely silent.” This was on a shoot with Central Cee, and I was struck by their shared contradiction (“both made oversharing their careers, but are the most introverted of stars,” I noted in my subsequent profile of the rapper). On another Vogue set, this time the lens on just her, she initially has a nervous energy and frozen smile, but in a private room on plush sofas, quickly warms up. So funny and magnetic, but sensitive and easily overwhelmed, the internet icon tells me she cried that morning—“I lost my coat hanger”—which she calls her most Cancerian trait. “I have so many negative things to say about Geminis.”

We talk just after her bombshell Call Her Daddy interview, in which she discussed ending her very public relationship, but a few weeks later she’s back to teasing Instagram pictures of them together and receiving huge presents (like, a new Mercedes huge) from someone. In retrospect, while her team had been keen to avoid the subject, there were hints that something was brewing. A Van Cleef bracelet she mentioned she got as a gift. Who from? “Secret.” A secret admirer? “Yeah, something like that,” she giggled. She struggled to describe how she was finding single life. “Um… same as… it’s just… I dunno… good. Yeah. It’s fine.”

The thing with Madeline is, as unfiltered as she may appear, ultimately she takes control of how much she reveals: “I always believe that if you want something to be private, it absolutely can be. As a girl whose first couple of relationships were with other girls when I was younger, you know how to keep a secret if you want to,” she smiles. “It’s not my first rodeo.”

Read our full conversation below.

Vogue: Did you always know you were a good storyteller?

Madeline Argy: Not until I started TikTok. But I feel like a lot of things make sense more when you look back… like in therapy and stuff. I’m like, oh… at the dinner table, it was only me talking. At my dad’s house, it was a fight between me and this one other girl for who could talk the most at the table. And with my mum and my sister, it’s always very much been, they just sit and listen at dinner.

Who was the other girl at your dad’s?

My stepmum’s kid. Yeah, stepsister is probably the word for that [laughing]—that was really rude. But actually, I don’t even think we would really compete at my dad’s house because she was so loud that it would just be her. She kind of took my spot.

What’s the first TikTok you can remember doing well?

The third or fourth. I was meant to meet the queen [her activist mother, Mikey Argy, was awarded an MBE], and thought it’d be really funny if I grew loads of pubes for it. I was like 14 or 15. I was going through Facebook one night, and saw this picture on my mom’s thing of us at [Buckingham Palace] and wanted to tell my friends. I used to be one of those people who would post novels on my Snapchat story to three or four friends. I just flipped that over to TikTok, and more people started to see it.

Tell us more about this…

This is such a tragic backstory, but I had read that pheromones make you like or dislike people on a brain level. I was like, maybe if I have loads of body hair, I’ll have more pheromones and people want to be, like, my friend—I’d just started a new school and I had no friends. It was around the same time as the queen, and I was like, yeah, I just won’t shave for the queen.

Where does the dichotomy between being shy but also willing to share stories most people would be too embarrassed to recount online come from?

A good example is somebody from Vogue earlier today was like, could you take the camera and film an intro, like, “Hi, I’m Madeline Argy, get ready with me for British Vogue…”—whatever. That was all I had to say, and I could not do it. We had to change the creative. But then I’ll happily go home, and the second I’m alone, tell the most disgusting thing to however many people. I’m so comfortable alone. I just am not comfortable around other humans. I don’t know what it is—I’m not worried about what they think of me, I just literally can’t speak to them or be creative around them. It’s great.

The numbers don’t feel like real people.

Yeah, if it did feel real, I would be a lot more overwhelmed by it. When you’re face-to-face with another human, you’re like [makes a freaked-out face], You’re real.

What has helped you become less anxious?

Not to make it sound like it’s ever just a choice, because it wasn’t a choice for me and you can’t just be like, I’m not gonna be anxious anymore. But, I wasn’t going anywhere, I couldn’t go to school, I couldn’t leave the house. You have to make the decision that you’re going to really scare yourself and do the thing that you’re terrified of doing in exchange for a life. That doesn’t mean that I’m less anxious, though. I’m just anxious in different locations.

I imagine being in the public eye to be quite anxiety-inducing. Do you find that?

I really do. Because I know what it feels like to have everyone have the incorrect perception of you and there’s nothing you can really do to fight against it. But also, I think, as long as you have good people around you, and people in the industry that know you correctly, then that’s very soothing.

You had an amazing fashion month in September, attending Valentino, Saint Laurent, and Prada shows.

Usually, I don’t really attend events, but I’ve been going to more because I want to be able to go by myself. I think it’s really important to learn how to conduct yourself like that and to not hide behind someone else’s leg. I’ve always done that. For ages, it felt like my first day at a new school and everyone knew each other. If you’ve not grown up with any exposure to this industry it’s a complete brainfuck; you have no idea what’s going on. Then you very quickly find out that a lot of people did grow up in this industry, which is quite disheartening.

Nepo babies!

Yeah, somehow everyone is a nepo, I feel lied to! Or just they’ve been here longer and they know what they’re doing. Or even if they have no idea, a lot of people are really good at making it seem like they do, which is a skill that I want to develop.

What are your dreams?

I wish I had some. My friend actually yelled at me on the phone for not having any because she was like, “I hate wasted potential, it gives me the ick!” I’ve been saying to everyone, “Oh, no, this just kind of happened suddenly, and I don’t really have a game plan.” That’s only cute for so long. But I just want to keep doing what I enjoy, which is what I’m doing at the moment. I guess the dream is just what I’m doing right now… Which is quite nice. I’m pretty happy, I’ve got my dog. Yeah! It’s all I really wanted.