Love Island USA’s Olandria and Chelley Talk Mean Girl Allegations and Makeup Mishaps

There’s a certain weight that comes with opening yourself up to the world on a dating show. It gets heavier when you’re a dark skin Black woman trying to fall in love while the world dissects your every move. Maybe that’s why when Love Island USA came calling, Chelley and Olandria both hesitated. Chelley was first approached for season six, while Olandria was contacted across multiple years before finally saying yes.

Whether it was the history-making momentum of season six or divine timing, the pair came to Fiji, unknowingly stepping into a journey that would bring them closer together.

“We're soul sisters for a reason,” Olandria tells Teen Vogue. “We'll always say to one another, ‘God knew we needed each other.’ I'm so happy the past seasons did not work out for us because season seven was the year to be here at the same time.”

Chelley smiles, adding: “We were supposed to be here together.”

Season seven arrived under enormous pressure. After season six became the most-watched show in streaming history, fans wondered if lightning could strike twice. Season seven did surpass records, but not without constant comparisons. For Chelley and Olandria, that meant immediate parallels to season six’s JaNa and Serena — something they weren’t interested in entertaining.

“Before going on the show, I told myself to just be myself,” Chelley says. “They could either like you or not, but I never want to feel like I’m putting up a facade. I also said, ‘Don't feel like you're not deserving of this opportunity, because there are so many people in this world that could have been here, but out of all those people, you were there, and that's for a reason.’”

Viewers tune in to Love Island USA daily to analyze relationships and vote, giving America almost the role of an ancillary cast member. That hyper-surveillance weighed heavily on Chelley and Olandria, who somewhere along the way were cast online as “Mean Girls.”

“It was confusing and so weird because we knew who we were in that villa,” Chelley says. “We know how much we showed up for every single person on that island, how well everyone spoke of us. So for us to come out of the villa and see that we're mean girls, we're like, ‘Mean girls where?’”

The perception was fueled when fellow islanders who exited early leaned into America’s idea of them.

“To see our fellow islanders playing into that narrative was hard,” Olandria says. “It's like, you knew us, why would you get out and let America, let social media get to your head? A lot of them played into that mean girl, bully narrative. I'm like, ‘Okay, this is not fair.’”

Both were criticized for speaking openly with castmate Huda about her behavior — feedback that wasn’t applied equally across the villa.

“How dare you guys say something like that to us, but not to everyone who was having that mean girl energy or mean girl moments? It goes back to the whole, you have to act a certain type of way [as a Black woman] because the moment you act ‘out of character’ you’re done,” Chelley says. “We didn't call anyone names, we didn't sit here and run up and down the villa yelling, screaming. We just spoke our truth and held people accountable for their actions.”

Reality TV has long villainized Black women. Instead of an escape, Chelley and Olandria were met with the same stereotypes constantly placed on dark skin women.

“If that's making someone a mean girl —” Chelley scoffs. Olandria jumps in: “Then I'll take that.”

During the season, both often felt like therapists and mothers to other islanders, offering advice and emotional support. Olandria especially took on that role, reflecting her real-life position as the oldest of six siblings.

“I knew going into the show, especially as a Black woman, I was representing more than just myself,” she says. “The world always tries to label us as ‘angry Black women.’ They use a moment of weakness and make that one specific time our whole character. I knew that when it came to my emotions, I had to dial that back, which I did for the majority of the season.”

But when she finally broke down after Taylor, her main partner, recoupled with Clarke, the judgment came swiftly.

“The moment that I did break and I kind of blew, people were like, ‘I knew it. That's the real her,’” she recalls. “I wanted to be unapologetically me, but it's like this world doesn't allow Black women to do that.”

Chelley says she tried to block out those pressures: “I still know myself, I know my truth, so I can't take how you guys feel about me with so much weight. You sit here and try to paint me to be whoever you want me to be in your mind because of five minutes of one episode, I think that says more about a person than even myself.”

She adds, “This world could be crazy sometimes and this is what it comes with when putting yourself in these type of spaces and places, which ultimately I'm just so grateful and so thankful because again, the woman that Olandria is, the woman that I am, we represent so many Black women and even women in general, and I think they see that in us.”

The criticism extended beyond their character to their appearance. Both chose knotless braids for the show, a protective style they maintained themselves for that exact reason.

“On our off days, Chelley and I would be on the floor crocheting my hair, looping my braids through [to freshen them up],” Olandria says. “We didn't have anyone there to braid our hair.”

Chelley adds: “I think one of the biggest things for us is when we both walked out, got into the villa, and looked at each other and we're like, ‘Oh, we both got braids.’”

While Olandria went to a Houston braider early May to get her hair done, Chelley actually arrived in Fiji with hers blown out. As soon as she landed, she says her hair turned into a big puff. She had traveled with braiding hair in her suitcase, just in case a hair fiasco happened.

She was then in her hotel room from 10 P.M. to 5 P.M. the next day — no sleep, she adds — doing boho braids on herself.

“I remember sitting down with the producers when I first landed and I was like, ‘By the way, I'm changing my hair,’” she says. “It was in a bun when I was talking to them. They were like, ‘What do you mean?’ I'm like, ‘I can't leave it like this. I'm going to braid it. So I'm just letting you guys know I'm going to have a different hairstyle.’ They're like, ‘Okay, is this still going to go with your look?’ And I'm like, ‘Yeah, of course.’”

During season six, online comments loved that Serena Page wore braids, but criticized JaNa Craig's choice to wear a lace front wig. This year, people talked about how “messy” Olandria and Chelley’s braids had become, as if they’d have access to fix them mid-show. (They also had to keep the same pedicure they came in with.) Their online judgment was a prime example of how the goalposts constantly change for Black women in the public eye.

“It was just sad to see the comments saying, ‘They need their hair done.’ You see how many challenges I'm doing,” Chelley says. “Since when have you known someone to go in the water 20 times in a summer, get slime and this and that in their hair, and it comes out looking fresh?”

The scrutiny extended to makeup, too.

“They called me Ms. Concealer, Ms. Bright. I'm like, ‘Well, you can't call me ugly,’” Olandria says with a laugh. “They always try to find a way to tear us down. Truly, I feel like they just hate seeing confident women, specifically confident Black women, because for years and decades, we always have to live in other people's shadows. I truly feel like, although Black women are the most disrespected people on earth, I wouldn't trade being one for nothing.”

Her bright undereye became a constant talking point online, though she says the cameras made it more saturated.

“I would ask Chelley every day, I was like, ‘Is my under eye bright? Let me know, because I'm going to put more,’” Olandria says.

Chelley, who often reassured her, laughs now: “Damn, was I lying?”

They continue to banter back and forth about their time in the villa, Olandria adding: “You don't have much time to process emotions on the island, so I was just trying to process them through my clothes and makeup, like, ‘We're going to be happy today.’ I’d come into the room like, ‘Girl, you're fixing to do it to them today.’ The whole time they were on the internet, tearing me a new one.”

The two leaned on each other for support, finding comfort in small routines. Their favorite memories were upstairs braiding hair together — Blue Magic Grease in one hand and a crochet needle in the other — while the other cast mates socialized downstairs.

“That was just a moment of like, ‘Yo, you're my girl. You know you're stuck with me, right? You're not going anywhere,’” Chelley says.

The negativity at times went as far as threats, a harsh reminder of the climate Black women navigate. Still, they refused to let it break them.

“I think a big part of it is we are very confident in ourselves,” Chelley says. “It's a thing of wanting to bring us down so badly, but why? If you see us feeling ourselves and happy about who we are, why can't that make you want to be happy as well?”

“Because it makes them uncomfortable,” Olandria follows. “I truly feel like, as a little girl, I always struggled with my skin complexion and my hair type. I have 4C hair, I have dark skin, and I have brown eyes. So I always felt like I looked the opposite of what beauty looked like in the Black community. Light skin, curly hair, bright eyes. If only I could go back and hug little Olandria and say, ‘Baby, we're going to be all right. You're beautiful.’”

Despite the noise, love outweighed the hate. Together, they left the villa with more than two million followers across their social media platforms and a loyal fan base. Both are excited for the future.

“I think my biggest goal right now is longevity,” Chelley says. “It's not just one thing that I want to do. From modeling, working with brands, or hosting, there are so many different things.”

“As for my relationship, your girl is happily in love,” she continues. “I'm not fully in a relationship yet because I'm like, ‘Look [Ace], you told me you want to be exclusive, I said, Yes. But until you ask, Will you be my girlfriend? I am not your girlfriend, okay?’ And if anyone knows anything about Ace, he's going to do it in the most romantic, grandest gesture ever. So I'm excited for that because he knows I'm extra too.”

Similarly, Olandria has her eyes set on multiple paths: “I don't want to just put myself in a box when it comes to certain things, like yes, I want to model. I want to go into beauty, podcasting... I want to do everything to see what sticks.”

Whether it be outsiders going for the jugular, attacking their physical features, or fans pitting them against each other, claiming that they aren’t truly friends, one thing is clear: Chelley and Olandria have each other's back.

From their adoring eyes looking out as the other speaks or their continued hand holding while on this press run, there’s an unsaid connection and sisterhood that comes with being Black women on reality television.

Amidst their continued laughs and “clock it” hand gestures during the interview, Olandria says with a full-faced smile: “My girl — we are in it for the long haul.”