The nice middle-class girl who’s shattered millions of teen hearts
Fans rumbled her romance with Harry Styles when she wore his shirt
HAVING worked her way up from nothing to become a leading light of the clean-eating revolution, Tess Ward is not about to rest on her laurels.
She has been busy posting images of picture-perfect meals and her svelte figure on the internet to satisfy her fans.
My, how the graft is paying off. Since Wednesday her following has swelled to 135,000 and rising, and Instagram granted her ‘verified’ status (an honour reserved for bona-fide movers and shakers).
Who would have thought an asparagus, quinoa and edamame salad could cause such a sensation? Or is there another explanation? For not all the Instagram comments have been positive. Or even related to food. ‘Go awaaaaay,’ snarled some. ‘Social climber,’ sniped another.
The reason? Tess is dating Harry Styles, former frontman of boyband One Direction. There was a howl of anguish from Directioners recently when Tess, 27, was snapped in a car driven by Harry. She then apparently rubbed salt in the wound by posting a picture of herself in the same red Gucci shirt Harry has been seen in.
For Tess to steal the prize from under the noses of his fanatical followers was always going to cause a stir. Small wonder she and Harry have kept their relationship under wraps since February, when it supposedly started.
Their meeting was casual. Tess is in with the ‘in’ crowd who count Harry as one of the gang. Harry was instantly smitten. As one friend of the star put it to me: ‘He was bowled over that someone he’d never heard of could be so amazing. He asked her out straight away.’
A series of dates followed, punctuated by work trips abroad for the pair— culminating in a reunion in London last week.
By all accounts the relationship has moved fast. He is understood to have invited her to join him for the premiere of Dunkirk, his acting debut. The fact that this will not take place until mid-July says everything about the seriousness of this relationship. Harry’s past romances were counted in days and weeks.
As they drove in Harry’s Audi, there was no attempt to hide their closeness. Nor the fact Tess’s tousled, unbrushed hair betrayed their comfortable intimacy.
Key to this is that Tess is not from an extraordinary background. Compared to past girlfriends, such as Taylor Swift (100 million Instagram followers) and Kendall Jenner (80 million), she is anonymous.
THIS is catnip for Harry, who has not known normal life since he auditioned for The X Factor in 2010. Born in South London in 1990, Tess moved to Oxford as a child where her mother, Kate, worked as a yoga instructor. Her businessman father, Kit, paid for education at d’Overbroeck’s College (€26,000 a year for sixth form) for Tess and her brother Dashiell.
When she read History of Art at Leeds University, Tess turned her hand to cooking for her housemates. A trip to India had left her with a severe stomach complaint, so she cooked only with unprocessed, ‘naked’ ingredients.
It was here her taste for hard graft came in. A natural beauty, modelling was a clear progression — she is signed to Models 1. Yet instead of taking easy money she followed a passion for food, qualifying as a Cordon Bleu chef and working in kitchens such as River Cottage and The Ritz.
Within two years she was a consultant with brands including Fortnum & Mason, Itsu and Grey Goose. She runs a food blog, The Yes Chef, and wrote a cookbook, The Naked Diet. Along the way she made well-connected friends. Millie Mackintosh, of Made In Chelsea fame, is one, as is Roxie Nafousi, another socialite probably best known as Damien Hirst’s ex-girlfriend.
At the heart of her appeal is her self-confidence, demonstrated in a YouTube video (since deleted) in which she posed topless during a massage. Friends say this is the result of yoga, and the fact she does not have an ounce of fat on her bronzed frame. But for all her glamour, she has a reputation to protect. While the Harry connection opens doors, she is far too canny to risk the business she has nurtured.
She continues to cultivate contacts, including Devon-based food delivery company Mindful Chef. Its director Myles Hopper told me: ‘Tess is lovely. There’s cynicism around gorgeous Instagram bloggers who are maybe prone to putting style before substance. But working with Tess it became obvious she’s not an Instagram show pony.
‘We collaborated for about a month. She did a cookery masterclass which showed how skilful she is. The fame isn’t going to her head, either. Before the Harry Styles thing came out, she called to see how we were getting on.
‘She could be forgiven for thinking she didn’t have to worry about people like us any more. But she works hard. I don’t see that changing.’
How she deals with her new fame remains to be seen. The online abuse from Harry fans has been excoriating, with some casting aspersions on her sexuality. Others are devastated to hear he has a girlfriend, decrying her as a ‘beard’ (a slang term for a partner who is used to conceal another person’s homosexuality) as they are convinced Harry is gay. The attacks have extended to Tess’s work. One sample Amazon review of her book said: ‘This chick is trying to use Harry to promo a sad excuse for a book.’
WHICH raises a conundrum for Harry’s followers. Is he not the most delectable example of manhood? Why, then, would anyone need an ulterior motive to date him? Such logic has not troubled the conspiracy theorists.
Speak to those who have known Harry since he stepped into the spotlight, however, and they say there is nothing extraordinary about his new love. It is the unassuming normality of Tess which first attracted him to her.
‘I’ve lost count of the number of people who meet Harry and marvel at how nice he is,’ says a record company executive who knows him well. ‘Harry is unspoiled. He tends to think the best of people, but can smell b ****** t at a thousand paces. Bear in mind he could take his pick of any famous girl he wants. But he’s been there and done that. If Tess is as straightforward as she seems, I could see them being together for a while. I’d never say forever, as being Harry is as close to madness as you can get without taking drugs. All you can do is wish them luck.’
If only the obsessive Harryphiles could do the same.