Cara Delevingne recalls ‘dark' truth behind her Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show debut

From the outside looking in, the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show looks like the stuff of dreams – but for Cara Delevingne, walking the runway coincided with one of the darkest periods in her life.

The British supermodel, 33, remembered the “darker” side of her Victoria’s Secret appearances more than a decade ago on Alex Cooper’s Call Her Daddy podcast.

During the conversation, Cooper showed Delevingne a photo of herself in a candy-striped outfit from her first show in 2012.

“That was fun, it felt like dress-up,” Delevingne reacted.

“But then there was something darker about it because at that show I was closeted, I was gay. I was also [thinking], has a lesbian ever done f---ing Victoria’s Secret? This is a big deal,” she said.

“I was having a great time but also very confused. I felt like I was an undercover lesbian.”

She recalled an innocent moment with fellow model Candice Swanepoel that had her in a “gay panic”.

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“I remember seeing Candice Swanepoel … we were in a hotel room eating pizza. She came in the bathroom and took off her clothes,” Delevingne said.

“Not in a sexual way, but that was what models do, and I passed out.

“I was standing up and I had to fall back on the toilet. It was a lot. The gay panic.

“I was constantly panicking.”

Delevingne, who is now four years sober after a public battle with addiction and mental health issues, said she’d self-medicate before the shows – which successfully banished any nerves.

“I woke up, probably had a couple shots of whiskey and a Xanax,” she said.

“I was having the time of my life after that, horrible.”

Delevingne walked for the brand twice in 2012 and 2013, but said she never felt like she fit in as one of the brands “angels”.

“Everyone else [had] very womanly bodies … I am still up and down, I have no arse,” she said.

“At that point I was like, ‘I’m not a Victoria’s Secret Angel. I’m a devil.’ I remember when they asked me to be one. I was like, ‘I don’t think I belong here.’”

Delevingne first came out as pansexual six years ago, before candidly opening up about being a lesbian on stage at a Rosalia concert last month.

“If you didn’t know this already, I’m a lesbian and my weakness used to be straight women,” Delevingne said in front of a crowd of thousands.

“I don’t know why, it’s just because they weren’t really straight. It’s the challenge ... but it’s also because I generally don’t think anyone is fully straight.”

She is now in a relationship with British singer-songwriter Leah Mason, known as Minke.

They first met at boarding school as teenagers and reconnected in 2022.

Delevingne is launching her own music career too, having released her first two songs I Forgot and Out of My Head in May.

Her debut album is expected later this year.