A Quote by Holly Willoughby

Being a child growing up in the 80s, my mum experimented with dressing me in quite a lot of day-glo. — © Holly Willoughby
Being a child growing up in the 80s, my mum experimented with dressing me in quite a lot of day-glo.
I think for me, growing up as an only child, I didn't have a lot of people around me or a lot of foreign influences, so growing up, I really kind of got lost in my imagination - for the better.
Growing up in the '80s in central New Jersey as a weird kid with a blue mohawk listening to the Sex Pistols and dressing really funky, I was bullied pretty badly. It was every single day in elementary school and kept going into middle school, too. I felt totally alone, without a single person there for me.
I have a nostalgia for the years I was growing up and experiencing new things for the first time - so the late '80s and early '90s are always fascinating to me. Those were the times that I was being informed about a lot of my tastes, and so the memories are fused with a lot of emotion.
Growing up in the '80s, questions of style and music and youth culture all seemed inherently political - like gay rights issues, dressing up, wearing makeup, arms protests. A lot of attitude and opinions were expressed through clothes, and they all were meaningful. So in that way, I was so excited about the connection between our private lives and politics - who I kiss, how I like to dance.
It's great hearing stories of my mum growing up in Brooklyn, then moving to Florida, having me and growing up with this eccentric, fun family. Although I don't eat a lot of Italian things, because I'm vegan. I was raised on meat and cheese, so I've had enough for anyone's normal life span.
My family prayed a lot, but we didn't really go to church. On Sunday, my mum and dad used to always tell me to read the Bible. That was important for me growing up, and I still do that every morning. It's something that is part of my routine, and I do it every day, whether it's a normal game or a big one.
My parents brought me up on all different styles of music, like my Mum would listen to Motown R&B and my Dad was quite 80's driven, so I was always surrounded by music growing up.
I used to watch my grandmother make fancy, Julia Child-style beef bourguignon. And growing up in New York City, I was exposed to many cultures. I experimented with Puerto Rican and Jamaican food.
I feel like it's me singing back to myself as a younger person and saying have confidence in being a bit different. I really felt I didn't fit in. My dad was from the Caribbean, my mum was English, we lived in quite a white area but we were quite poor, but also quite brainy, and I was a really, really skinny child so I felt a bit awkward about all these things.
It was just me and my mum growing up, and my mum's always said that's why I'm so mature. We were best friends, and if it wasn't for her, I wouldn't even have started athletics, because she wanted me to have a hobby.
My mum doesn't enjoy sometimes listening to me tell staff off, and I say to my mum, it's a kitchen, not a hair-dressing salon.
The work my mum does, a lot of it is re-housing homeless people, that's a real job. I play make-believe and dressing up for a living!
When I had my first child, I went back to Ireland to live with my mother. So, a typical day there was me being a mother, with my mum showing me how to do things.
Growing up, I saw Mum as being so celebratory of our culture. So I was surprised to hear - during discussions sparked by the Black Lives Matter protests - about the racism she experienced growing up, and the shame she once felt about being black.
Growing up, there was a lot of pressure for women to be good-looking, but my mum was very strict, and she didn't allow me to wear make-up. Looking back, it was good for me. It slowed me down from becoming an adult too quickly.
I was an '80s child, so I grew up loving all kinds of '80s rock. I like R&B, too.
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