Why Kate Moss has decided to open up now

The interview where she discussed the nervous breakdown she had in her teen years and even her relationship with Johnny Depp seems to come from a different celebrity to the iconic but silent Kate we used to.

ELLE caught up with Angela Buttolph, author of Kate Moss Style to find out why the model has suddenly decided to open up now. ‘She’s more honest and open in [The Vanity Fair] interview than she’s really been before. And I’m not surprised.’ Angela told us.

The social media age might have something to do with it; ‘In this age of access-all-areas - tweeting and blogging and reality TV – people are comfortable revealing far more than they might have done in the past. I guess there comes a point where you have read so much inaccurate reporting that you want to be able to put your own truth across.’

In the past, Kate’s motto ‘never explain, never complain’ meant that we didn’t get the chance to hear her side of the story – in particular about what wasn’t going so well, or anything negative in the model’s life. Angela says ‘It’s notable that the stories she’s revealing now show that it has been a hard journey for her. I think we all like to buy into the “charmed life” and “meteoric rise” of what appears to be her fairy tale, so I think it’s interesting that the stories she’s chosen to tell now show that she’s had some really difficult, dark times too.’

However, author and journalist Angela points out that even though it’s unprecedented exposure for the model, it’s still all on her own terms. [Although] ‘it is kind of infuriating for a biographer . . . you can never really know someone, however much research you do or however famous they are. You only have what they’re prepared to reveal to you. Kate’s revealed much more of herself now than ever before, but she’s still an enigma.’

And the final question; because Kate: The Kate Moss Book is purely image-based, does Angela foresee a time when Kate will publish a tell-all autobiography? ‘Oh my goodness, I SO hope so! But I think maybe that will come much later in life, maybe a couple of decades from now. . . I can imagine Jefferson Hack or someone close to her writing her story for her ‘in her own words’.