Jade Thirlwall ‘ghosted’ by Harry Styles after going on date as teenagers
By Hannah Roberts, PA Entertainment Reporter
Former Little Mix star Jade Thirlwall has revealed that Harry Styles “ghosted” her after the pair went on a date as teenagers.
Thirlwall, 32, who released her debut single last year, found fame on The X Factor in 2011 but had also auditioned the previous year, when Styles came third with boy band One Direction.
Appearing on The Louis Theroux Podcast, Thirlwall was asked about a video clip in which she looked “fairly blase” about Styles, according to Theroux, who said comments suggested she was giving him “the side eye”.
“I didn’t know he was gonna be THE Harry Styles, did I?” she told Theroux.
“I think we went on, like, one date when, again, when we’re, like, 16 or something.
“We just got put in the band. And it was really funny, because we kept in touch.
“And then the minute they (One Direction) went on live shows, he didn’t message me back and I thought ‘That’s it now, he’s gone, he’s made it’.
“And then I made it the next year and then I saw him in a room after, and he was, like, ‘I’m really sorry that I ignored you’.”
Asked by Theroux if Styles had ghosted her, she said: “Yes. But, again, I was so young, it didn’t really matter. But he was always very, very lovely.”
Styles, 30, was in the popular boy band alongside Liam Payne, Niall Horan, Louis Tomlinson and Zayn Malik – who left in 2015 – before the group went on an indefinite break in 2016.
In October last year, Payne died in Argentina at the age of 31 after suffering multiple trauma and “internal and external haemorrhage” when he fall from a third-floor balcony of a hotel in the capital, Buenos Aires.
Little Mix, comprised of Leigh-Anne Pinnock, Perrie Edwards, Jesy Nelson and Thirlwall, were formed on The X Factor after the singers initially auditioned as solo acts, eventually becoming the first girl group to win the show.
The band, currently on a break, have had five UK number one singles and seven UK top 10 albums.
Nelson left the group in 2020, citing mental health struggles.