The entrepreneur and influencer talks personal style, finding her passions, and not showing all sides of herself to the internet.

Photography&nbsp;Fiona Torre

Fashion Jennifer Eymere

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Devon Lee Carlson&rsquo;s energy is infectious. The 25-year-old is lively and chatty over the phone from her LA home, despite having only just woken up. One conversation with her leaves you feeling like you&rsquo;ve found your new best friend; everything about her persona feels genuine and relatable. It makes perfect sense why the internet and <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/categories/fashion">fashion</a> brands alike are obsessed with entrepreneur turned influencer. Before Covid-19 relegated everyone to the confines of their own home, Carlson starred in Louis Vuitton&#39;s Spring/Summer 2020 accessories campaign, and was a guest of Saint Laurent at their Paris Fashion Week spring/summer 2020 show. In February, Carlson, alongside boyfriend Jesse Rutherford (of The Neighborhood), collaborated with <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/fashion-week/marc-jacobs-runway-show-spring-2020">Marc Jacobs</a> on a Valentine&rsquo;s Day T-shirt. It sold out in minutes.&nbsp;

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Carlson originally made a name for herself as a co-founder of&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wildflowercases.com/">Wildflower Cases</a>, a phone case company she started with her family after a chance encounter at a restaurant with <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/music/miley-cyrus-mark-ronson-2018">Miley Cyrus</a>. Cyrus gushed over Carlson&rsquo;s phone case and posted a photo online, tagging Carlson, who, on the car ride home, was swamped with notifications from people asking where they could get one. &ldquo;My phone started going crazy. I was freaking out,&rdquo; says Carlson. &ldquo;We came up with a name quickly in the car, so I started replying to people on Twitter saying wildflowercases.com.&rdquo;&nbsp;Her family put together the website in one night.

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At the time, Devon was mid-way through her senior year of high school and in the midst of trying to figure out her future plans when the business fell into her lap. &ldquo;All of my friends were going out of state for school,&rdquo; she acknowledged, knowing at the time that if she were to continue with school, it would be at a local community college.&nbsp;Carlson ended up doing a semester at community college before dropping out, deciding to focus exclusively on the family business.&nbsp;&ldquo;I didn&#39;t really have time to focus on school and put my all into the company. I was just kind of half-assing both,&quot; she explained,&nbsp;noting she could always return to school at a later date. &ldquo;I figured I&#39;d go full 100% Wildflower.&rdquo;&nbsp;

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It&#39;s safe to say she figured right. College wouldn&#39;t teach her how to grow a business in real-time, nor would it teach her how to manage a brand.&nbsp;&quot;I think running the business with [my family]&nbsp;was a lot easier because we all respected each other as co-founders. I wasn&#39;t looking at my dad as my dad,&rdquo; Carlson says, &ldquo;I was learning from him. My mom was teaching me how to stud and how to come up with designs. I gained a whole new respect for my sister because she&#39;s so tech-savvy.&quot;&nbsp;

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But like many her age, she&rsquo;s still figuring it out her true passions. &ldquo;Having started Wildflower completely by accident, it wasn&#39;t like I was passionate about making phone cases. It&#39;s something that I learned to find a passion for,&quot; she granted. Fashion&nbsp;and its transformative powers have&nbsp;been a lifelong love. &ldquo;During the day, I&#39;ll wear no makeup and a sweatsuit, but whenever I&#39;d go out to <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/fashion/persol-campaign-celebration-2019">dinner</a>, obviously pre-quarantine, I felt like I could dress up and be a different version of myself. I could show a new side of myself, all through clothes. You can just become whoever you want to be on the outside. I think that&#39;s so powerful.&rdquo;

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It&#39;s the authentic nature of this passion and excitement that Carlson&#39;s 881,000 followers look forward to everyday, and why major fashion houses have started to take notice.&nbsp;Whether she&#39;s in Louis Vuitton, or a leopard bikini with her hair up in a banana clip, she&#39;s smiling, or even better, making some&nbsp;ridiculous face that feels incredibly in the moment.&nbsp;&ldquo;I&#39;m just going ham and wearing all this stuff that little Devon would want me to wear,&rdquo; she says, noting that she takes&nbsp;<a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/audemars-piguet/chloe-wise-interview-2019">inspiration</a> from the styles she saw growing up&mdash;very &lsquo;90s and early 2000s.&nbsp;&ldquo;It&rsquo;s like 13 Going On 30, 13-year-old me is telling me what to wear every day.&rdquo;&nbsp;

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In addition to fashion, modeling fills some of the void she felt when she stopped dancing, and being behind the camera felt like second nature to being on a stage.&nbsp;&ldquo;There was a similar energy that I felt on set to when I was performing with dance.&rdquo; There&#39;s also the YouTube channel, where she often posts vlogs of herself and her friends, which can blur the line between her work and her life. &ldquo;I feel like I&#39;m constantly working because I do blog a lot of my life,&rdquo; she says, &ldquo;so even when I&#39;m doing that it&#39;s kind of work, but I&#39;m also just being myself and hanging out with my <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/fashion/bridesmaid-gift-ideas-wedding-planning-friends">friends</a>.&rdquo;

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&ldquo;I&#39;m very optimistic and easy-going; that&#39;s the main part of me,&rdquo; Carlson says, when asked what she really wants people to know about her, and what they may not necessarily glean from looking at her feed.&nbsp;&ldquo;I think there&#39;s a lot of sides that I don&#39;t show on the internet, mostly because it&#39;s just for my friends and my boyfriend and my family. I am my real self online, but there&#39;s more to me that maybe everyone doesn&#39;t know.&rdquo;

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We&#39;re here for that, so long as the fashion looks keep coming. &ldquo;I do have a lot of exciting things that hopefully still happen coming up in the future,&rdquo; Carlson says, &ldquo;but I just want to make 13-year-old Devon proud.&rdquo;&nbsp;

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Assistant Stylist&nbsp;Kenzia Bengel de Vaulx 
Hair&nbsp;Kevin Jacotot 
Makeup&nbsp;Carole Lasnier 
Interview&nbsp;Caroline Mas

Text&nbsp;Pauline Borgogno

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Devon Lee Carlson Wants To Make Her 13-Year-Old Self Proud

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