Lili Reinhart’s Balancing Act
The actress shares how she keeps it real on social media, navigating mental health, and the diamonds that connect her to her family.
EARRINGS BACHENDORF’S, MARLI • BROOCHES SELIM MOUZANNAR • RINGS BACHENDORF’S • JUMPER VICTORIA BECKHAM
Being on set with Lili Reinhart is like watching magic happen. Every angle, movement, and scene produces a set of stunning shots, photos that only someone who is self-described “hyper-aware” of her face can produce. And yet, she does it without really trying. It seems the 29-year-old actress was born to be in front of the camera, whether it’s for a TV show with a rabid cult following like Riverdale or glowing on set in diamonds.
In fact, Reinhart shares that being on set is one of the places she feels most confident. “I’ve always loved playing dress up as a kid,” she shares with Only Natural Diamonds. “I loved those big clip-on jeweled earrings. I’ve always loved sparkle.”
Meet the Author
- Jane Asher is a social media manager with a passion for pop culture.
- She holds a Bachelor’s degree in English from Washington University in St. Louis.
- As a journalist, her work has been featured in publications such as InStyle Magazine, Stylecaster, Martha Stewart Weddings and more.
After our shoot, Lili Reinhart is still glowing. One might think she’d use the momentum for a fabulous night out in NYC—especially given the timing, in the middle of fashion week when parties abound. Instead, she told us she was planning on hunkering down in her hotel room with Joe’s Pizza—perhaps not fabulous, but certainly classic New York. And she did just that, as evidenced by a funny TikTok the actress posted to her feed, eating a perfect slice of plain pizza. While holding a box of Joe’s, she lip syncs: “I would never order a full pizza for myself. I mean, I’ll take it but…”
Lili Reinhart on Social Media and Mental Health
These days, Lili Reinhart is more intentional than ever with her social media posts, aware of how many young women and girls look up to her as a role model, especially when it comes to mental health. “I was joking with my psychiatrist about how I keep talking about my depression in interviews, and he’s like, ‘Maybe you don’t need to focus on your depression in interviews.’ And we both laughed,” she shares in a meta moment, unapologetic about letting us into this intimate window of her life.
“But I think it sort of always rears its head in a way because people do see me as someone who is so outspoken about their mental health, and I wouldn’t have it any other way,” she says. Reinhart initially started sharing her mental health journey on social media to feel less alone. “To know that we’re all sort of in this together is a comforting feeling. I never set out to be someone who was so open about it. Now, ten years later, I go give talks and do so many panels about mental health,” she adds. “But I guess that just shows how many people need to hear other people talk about it.”
“It’s a delicate balance that I’ve learned from my own mistakes over the last ten years being a public figure,” she says of deciding when to share versus keep things offline. “The other day, I wanted to share that I was having a really bad day, but I didn’t,” she admits. “If I have to second-guess whether I’m going to regret something, I just don’t post it at all. That’s sort of my rule of thumb now,” she continues. “But I do think that continuing to talk about [mental health] in open and honest ways, in the right settings, is the right thing to do.”
Lili Reinhart knows all too well that social media can be a constant push and pull, but for the most part, she feels she has found a positive community online, specifically on TikTok. “It feels like the warm social media app that you go to for community… like, come sit with me in my living room as if we’re on FaceTime, and let me tell you about something that happened to me today. It feels vulnerable as hell, but there’s something lovely about it,” she shares. A quick scroll through her feed feels like catching up with a friend and bonding over shared experience—like unapologetically ordering an entire pizza from Joe’s.
Reinhart has shared that her mental health is often tied to her skin health, and she has always been open about her skin journey on social media. She shares her good days and bad days, feeling most confident when her skin is taken care of. “It helps because I have a skincare line that I founded [called Personal Day]. So when my skin is being taken care of and has a little glow to it, I feel really confident.” Reinhart was certainly glowing on our Zoom together—and even more so on set—thanks to Personal Day and the diamonds she was wearing from Jessica McCormack, Beck, Bernard James, and Bachendorf’s.
Lili Reinhart’s Personal Heirlooms
“I love diamonds, but who doesn’t?” she gushes. “Diamonds are usually what I gravitate toward when it comes to jewelry—gold and diamonds.” Like anyone with personal heirloom pieces in their collection, Reinhart has found a connection to her grandmother, who passed last year, through her jewelry. “She had all this beautiful jewelry but kept it tucked away in these boxes,” she shares. “I picked out this pretty ring, a simple gold band with a diamond in the middle, that I wear now to feel close to her.”
“I also brought home a watch of hers, and it’s still in this little box in my closet, and when I open it, it smells like her,” she says fondly.
Diamonds are usually what I gravitate to when it comes to jewelry.
A lover of delicate jewelry, Lili Reinhart gravitates toward gold and diamond pieces. A new dainty bracelet from her boyfriend has become an everyday staple, along with her many ear piercings. “I got the first holes pierced at Claire’s and then I did my double and triple piercings on my own in my bathroom,” she remembers with a laugh. “It was… traumatizing.” But in the end, it was all worth it, as she now has more canvas to play with fun studs, hoops, huggies, and crawlers across her ear.
Lili Reinhart’s Jewelry On Film and Red Carpet
Reinhart has worn some exceptional pieces on the red carpet, including a pair of major diamond earrings at one of her first-ever Golden Globes parties, marking one of the first times she borrowed a piece of high value. “I didn’t even get any photos of me in that outfit, which is sad,” she laments. “But it’s sort of like icing on the cake when you throw in some sparkles.”
Beyond the red carpet, the actress has embodied some iconic characters, like the beloved Betty Cooper in Riverdale and Olive Smith in the much-anticipated upcoming film The Love Hypothesis, based on the best-selling novel by Ali Hazelwood. Betty’s Peter Pan collars and pearls define her look, and Olive’s lab coat is a wardrobe staple, but this past spring, while shooting a film called Very Best People, Reinhart had her first encounter with a character whose look is defined by her jewels.
“The whole movie takes place in 24 hours, and I’m wearing large gold hoops, this bedazzled gemstone gold watch, and layered necklaces. It all goes with the character, and it all makes sense,” she shares. “That was the first time that jewelry has actually played a part in the storytelling of a character.”
How Lili Reinhart Gets Into Character
To get in the zone for Olive Smith in The Love Hypothesis, Lili Reinhart found herself watching a lot of rom-coms in her downtime—“not necessarily for inspiration but for comfort,” she says. “I was really filming that black-cat-guy, golden-retriever-girl dynamic type of movie, which is funny because it’s the opposite in real life,” she adds.
“Tom [Bateman], who plays Adam in the movie, is very happy, bright, bubbly, and social, and I am introverted and a little bit more shy, quiet, and reserved. So, we’re playing the opposite of our real-life personalities a little bit.”
Her latest project, the limited series Hal & Harper, felt more true to her personality. “The way I act in Hal & Harper could not be more different than the way that I act in The Love Hypothesis.” The series follows siblings Hal and Harper, played by Cooper Raiff and Reinhart, respectively, as they grapple with complicated feelings as their dad, played by Mark Ruffalo, sells their childhood home.
“This genre is really my bread-and-butter type of project.” Reinhart’s love for the show and her character is palpable. “I got to play a woman who feels so deeply human. There’s no level of caricature about her.” Angst, laughter, love, and plenty of tears make Hal & Harper an endearing watch, and the actress truly shines throughout the series, tapping into these emotions with ease—plus, it helps that she’s a pretty crier.
“I find crying in projects to be intimidating at first but ultimately quite cathartic,” she muses. “It feels like you’re just given full permission to feel all of your feelings because, in one way or another, your emotions are going to be used for a greater good, which is ultimately the project or the performance. So you’re sort of like, ‘Well, there’s no better time to feel than right now.’”
It can be a vulnerable place to be, but the actress feels rightfully at home in front of a camera. She credits Cooper Raiff, creator, writer, and director of the project, with creating a safe and balanced atmosphere on set. “I didn’t go into every day thinking ‘Oh no, I have to cry again.’ Sometimes it isn’t even written into the script,” she says. “I had permission to feel on set, and I tapped into the intuitive moments of where the emotion felt right.”
Reinhart’s performance in Hal & Harper has already received praise from critics and audiences, but the actor is grateful to just be in the room. “I’ve not done a project that really warrants critical reviews,” she shares. “So, when our show was perceived so well and getting a lot of love at Sundance, it’s obviously very satisfying. But ultimately, I’m so proud of the show and I’m so proud of what we created and what Cooper was able to do on such a small budget and such a limited time frame.”
Lili Reinhart and Her Riverdale Legacy
Reinhart may be attracting new audiences with Hal & Harper, but she already had a devoted fan base with Riverdale, especially as they watched real friendships between the main cast members develop offscreen. And although they would love to see more of Reinhart, Madelaine Petsch, and Camila Mendes together on social media—their joint TikTok account, @blondebrunetteredhead, has 11.7M followers—Reinhart believes in keeping some things sacred.
“We see each other, and we don’t tell the world about it, and I think there’s something protective in that,” she says with a sly smile. “No one but KJ [Apa] and I know when the last time I spoke to KJ was, and I think there’s something sweet about that. But I would love for people to believe and know that we are still friends because we are.”
She sees her Riverdale castmates as family, keeping up in group chats and getting together whenever they can. “You don’t need to see them all the time to still have that bond forever, and I think that will just kind of always exist,” she says. Reinhart herself sometimes can’t believe how much time was spent on the Riverdale set. “I had an Ulta event for my skincare line and this girl said, ‘I’ve been watching you since I was ten,’ and she’s eighteen,” she shares in disbelief. “That really puts things into perspective, doesn’t it?”
Lili Reinhart continues to be that girl—relatable yet aspirational, a voice of reason in the social media noise, down to Earth yet completely at ease dressed up in natural diamonds. Because, as she said, “Who doesn’t love diamonds?”
Photographer: Wai Lin Tse
Stylist: Marissa Baklayan
Creative Director: Lizzy Oppenheimer
Hair Stylist: Gonn Kinoshita
Makeup Artist: Melissa Hernandez
Manicurist: Yukie Miyakawa
Entertainment Editor At Large: Glynis Costin
Creative Production: Petty Cash Production
Lighting Director: David Jaffe
Photo Assistant: Dustin Stefansic
Digital Tech: Jenny Czyborra
Styling Assistant: Austin Stoll
Tailor: Irina Maiorova
