Interview: Olive (@rainbwfriend) is the Rainbow Friend/Blogger You’ve Always Wanted

The Rainbow Personified

By Ghia Vitale

Olive is the human rainbow, blogger, and social media star who runs The Rainbow Friend. They make the world a more colorful place with their style, charm, and content. 

When you’re scrolling on social media, you can’t miss Olive. They are the actual personification of a rainbow, so they stand out like the brilliant rainbow they are. When I discovered Olive, I was immediately enchanted by their rainbow hair, but there’s much more to them than their appearance—Olive is a blogger with a unique perspective. They cover plus size fashion, beauty, mental health awareness, toy collecting, and Disney at The Rainbow Friend. From the moment I finished one of their blog posts, I knew I just had to learn more about this self-described “rainbow dressing, bright-haired color enthusiast from SoCal!”

Keep reading to check out Olive’s exclusive interview with Quail Bell Magazine:

According to your blog post called Let's Talk Self-Confidence, you mentioned that you started dressing colorful in early 2018. Was there a specific event or realization that inspired you to start dressing in rainbow fashion?

A couple of years before I started dressing in colorful fashion, I was really into rainbows, but I felt like I needed to “grow up.” Because of this, I attempted some more “adult” styles until I came across @studiomucci on Instagram. Seeing Amina, a plus-size adult, dress in rainbow fashion changed everything for me. I finally felt like I could embrace the rainbows that I love so much and that it was okay for me, a fat adult, to dress boldly.

How do you relate to rainbows? What does the rainbow mean to you as a symbol?

To me, rainbows are happiness. Bright colors bring me so much joy! It’s hard to be sad when surrounded by beautiful, bold colors. It’s also a bonus to me, as a lesbian, that rainbows are a pride symbol!

How would you describe your unique style of queer representation and fat representation?

Loud. I think with being a human rainbow, my lesbian identity and fatness are loud! I think my bright colors draw attention to both my body and my gayness. I love it!

What do you think plus-size fashion needs more of?

Diversity! Plus-size models only feature one specific body. Therefore, clothing is really only made to fit that one specific body: tall with a large chest, thighs, and hips, small waist, and basically no stomach. I don’t think I have ever actually seen someone shaped like that in real life. And it’s hard when even the clothes that are supposed to be made for your body don’t even fit right. Not only does there need to be more body shape diversity, there also needs to be more models of color, disabled models, trans and nonbinary models, hairy models, and all sorts of other types! Not just tall, white, “thick” models.

I read your blog post about how you have DID (Dissociative Identity Disorder). What do you wish more people knew about living with DID?

It’s not scary! DID is extremely demonized in media! It is not one nice, “normal” alter and then one murderous criminal alter! Movies and other media that portray DID as some evil demon alter ego situations are so horrible and give people the absolutely wrong idea and just enforce harmful stereotypes. There are so many ways to experience DID. Some people do have one alter, others have hundreds, and they can like all sorts of different things. They also have all sorts of personality types. We are not one nice person and one evil murderer.

I hear you're a Disney fan and saw your blog post about Disney Day Trip Essentials. What are some of your favorite Disney movies and why?

I love this question! My favorite Disney movie is The Princess and the Frog! I love the music in it so much and think Tiana is the sweetest angel! On the Pixar end of Disney, I am very into the Toy Story movies lately! I love and collect toys, so it being about toys really appeals to me. However, I also just think all the characters are so funny and cute. The movies just make me feel so happy.

Are you working on any projects you'd like to mention?

Right now, I am primarily working on my blog. It is a huge source of happiness for me. It is helping me stay motivated to function and get things done! I am also working on growing my Disney Instagram account, @thedisneyfriend, and I am hoping to jump back into creating YouTube videos soon! 

For more updates, follow Olive on Instagram or Twitter. Thanks for reading!