When 2 Become 1: Gia Ford and Melanie Lehmann In Conversation

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As a combined creative force, Gia Ford and Melanie Lehmann are a duo to be reckoned with. The former produces slick, seductive tunes – her last EP Murder In The Dark was a trippy rabbit hole compared to her shiny debut Poster Boy. The latter is a self-taught photographer and creative director with a singular creative vision, unafraid of pursuing it to the very end, whatever the cost. Melanie creates all of Gia’s visuals, and the couple are a lesson in teamwork making the dream work: Gia recently terminated her contract with her old record label Dirty Hit due to the label’s treatment of Melanie as a woman of colour.

Over Zoom, the pair are warm and in tune, comfortable to let one speak for the other, but equally conscious of each other as individuals and not wanting to put words in each other’s mouths. Melanie is refreshingly blunt, saying exactly what she thinks and munching on a plate of chips throughout. Gia is diplomatic yet teasing, choosing her words carefully and saying precisely what she means. It was lovely to see them go from professional to tender in seconds, spending one moment seriously explaining their next career steps and gushing over Robbie Williams the next.

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How did you guys originally start working together?

Melanie: We got into bed first!

Gia: The personal came before the professional, but we basically just worked together at first for fun. We just took pictures of each other and Melanie would edit them. It was quite quick, wasn’t it, when we first got together and then we started taking pictures in this tiny little flat in Dalston; we just made it work.

M: Yeah, but that was cos I was still in university and experimenting. It was just easy to have someone there who would jump into the set for you.

G: I was the test model and then eventually we ended up doing shoots together. But it was quite a natural, creative thing to do together early on.

How do you manage the personal and the professional, now that you’ve been doing it for a while?

G: It doesn’t really feel awkward. Even if we’re not doing my visuals or work for anything legitimate, we just do it anyway cos it’s fun. Melanie has loads of ideas that she wants to get out, and I’m, again, just there to be the model for it.

M: It’s easy until someone else jumps in.

Melanie wears Earrings - Sandy T.H. Jewellery; Dress - Livia Tang. Gia wears Shirts and trousers - Samanta Sutkė; Ribbon, suspender and earrings - stylist’s own.

You separated from your ex-record label Dirty Hit because of their treatment of Melanie as a woman of colour, and other people of colour on their label. How has that been? Are you guys managing the aftermath alright? 

M: Better than ever! Dirty Hit who? I’ve never heard of them!

G: I don’t have anything else to say other than everything I’ve left on my Instagram, and Melanie’s left it up on her Instagram, but I will say that it feels a lot better now that I’m not working with them and we get to have that freedom of expression, and not have those a million annoying conversations every time I want to make something. We’re doing well now because we’re basically just trying to put it in the past. It’s taken so much energy, right?

M: It’s on me because I like to talk, but obviously she has to keep her image a bit more. I don’t fucking care! The thing is, we’re moving just at the same pace that we were, maybe even a little bit faster, but it’s stress-free. There’s no underlying anxiety of receiving texts being like, “oh we don’t like that”.

G: It feels like there’s a horizon there and we can just go into it and do whatever we want now, so it’s nice. I’m glad that it’s kind of over now.

How’s lockdown been in terms of your work ethic and creativity?

G: I was really worried, personally, because in everyday life, I get really bad creative stagnation periods. But when the lockdown first began, I just went straight in and made loads of songs — so it’s actually been really productive for me. I think it’s because I know what to expect of every day and I can take it easier. Whereas before I would have other stuff I was doing in the day, and then I would feel so much pressure to go and do something or finish something. This time I feel like cos every day is so formless anyway, it actually leaves me a lot of space to be really clear.

M: We’re very disciplined people when it comes to work. We work all the time, day in, day out. At first, we worked a lot. We really tried to figure out so many things. Then because Gia was still with her ex-label, they wanted us to do so many things because I feel like every business started freaking out about how to keep their artists relevant, and to be fair, we know that we’re relevant. We don’t need any validation from anyone to know that. We kind of did it naturally anyway, but it became really tiring after a while. Then I guess, with the death of George Floyd, we stopped.

Melanie wears dress - Brian de Carvalho; earrings - Sandy T.H. Jewellery. Gia wears shirt - Steven Stokey Daley; waistcoat and trousers - Adelina Rusu; earrings - stylist’s own.

It’s recently been Pride month, but because your relationship is quite online and quite public, do you feel that the visibility of being queer influences your work or your output at all?

M: I do – I don’t make my work specifically about being queer, but I talk a lot about being queer. I know that we have loads of queer followers and we bounce off of that, but I don’t think we go out of our ways to create content or create music to represent it. We do represent queerness –

G: Just by virtue of being queer.

M: Yeah, like we don’t make songs about pussies!

G: It’s weird, because I don’t really think about it that much. Obviously because we’re in a queer relationship, it makes it more of a spotlight thing. I guess the relationship does influence our online presence more than it would if we weren’t together. Separately, we don’t really linger on the queer thing very much. I feel very proud of it, but I’m never really talking about it — unless I’m defending it.

M: I feel like without you, without us being in a relationship, people wouldn’t see me as queer because I don’t suit the stereotypical image of a white lesbian, because I’m not. I’m not butch –

G: No one could make any assumptions about you.

M: Yeah, and no one would be able to find out, like, oh she is gay. That came even after we’ve been together, some of my ex-friends who I’ve had to cut ties with. They still question my sexuality because they’ve never really seen me, or someone like me, being queer before.  I do feel like it helps me personally, being with this butch white lesbian, to validate my own sexuality.

Through working together, what is one way that both of you think the other has most improved creatively?

M: In the visual world, Gia has really improved with her confidence in front of the camera. The first few times I shot her, she was so insecure that she cried. She couldn’t bear seeing herself.

G: I’m not gonna talk forever about it, but it’s so funny. I’d never really been photographed before, so I was quite exposed. 

M: Sonically, I just think you’ve improved, period. I have no fucking clue about music but the way that you just come up with songs now. Also the fact that you had to unlearn a lot of gaslighting that has been put upon you, forcing you to have all these insecurities in songwriting and producing – now that you’re more comfortable with that, that is such an improvement.

G: Thanks babe! Ok my turn. We were looking at our archived photos on Instagram this morning;  it’s not like at the time I thought that her photos were shit cos I’ve always thought her photos were great. But now in hindsight, looking at her current work and her work from when we first got together, you just see the difference from there. It’s really amazing to see that.

M: It’s just like, what was I thinking?

G: It’s ok, we all live and we learn. But you’ve improved in every single way. She taught herself everything and in the space of two years, she’s got to this place with it. It was through brainstorming, shooting, practising on different models, building sets and stuff. We used to live in a flat in Dalston; there were five of us altogether in this flat and it was a two-bedroom flat. There were people on the sofa and it was just really cramped. She would just make it happen. Sometimes I would come back from the studio and there were 20 people in the flat: the model, makeup artist, the whole flat was taken over. Through you doing that, you just made it happen for yourself and I’m really proud of you.

Left: Melanie wears earrings - Sandy T.H. Jewellery; dress - Olivia Von Halle. Gia wears ribbon - Bruna Ignatowkski; white shirt - AMAZIN; jacket - Claudio Lugli; trousers - stylist’s own. Right: Melanie wears dress - ISBIM; coat - Livia Tang; earrings - stylist’s own. Gia wears coat - Cortili; shirt - Livia Tang; trousers - Steven Stokey Daley.

Melanie wears suit - Mithridate; shirt - Kawa Key; earring - Sandy T.H. Jewellery. Gia wears suit - Kawa Key.

What are both of your plans for the visual side of Gia Ford and the musical side of Gia Ford?

G: My music has actually taken a swift, sharp turn somewhere else. I’m not going to start making heavy metal or anything, but my plan for it is that it’s going to be more live-sounding and has a more human element to it. The past two EPs were very computerised, and I love them, but I want to get some actual human beings in the room and play live. 

M: I feel like you haven’t met Gia Ford yet.

G: She’s my biggest hype man!

M: No, but you haven’t listened to all of this new stuff. All of the stuff that is already out there, it’s great, but a lot of it has been so fabricated.

G: Especially the first release. At first, I was finding my feet in the industry, and I thought that I had to be a certain way due to certain people telling me that. I don’t know visually how we’re going to go about it yet, do you?

M: Yeah! It’s going to be a lot lighter, I think. The last project was pretty dark, pretty camp – the new stuff is going to be more classic.

G: It’s a lot more heartfelt as well. I feel like I’m actually writing a lot more emotional songs as opposed to just cool songs. Just imagine the Robbie Williams video for ‘Feel’. That’s the vibe we’re aiming to go.

Are you hopeful for the future?

G: I feel quite hopeful. Because of quarantine and just the general craziness of this whole year, and with everything with the label, there've been days where I’m like: this is so stressful do I even want to make music anymore? Which is just me being dramatic. But genuinely I do feel hopeful, and I know that because we have a good work ethic overall, we always make it happen.

M: I am very hopeful. You know why? Because for once, in my whole entire life, I can say ‘white people’ with my whole chest and I don’t have to feel bad about it.

G: And everyone’s like [nods meekly].

M: For once, I actually feel safe doing that as well. I also feel really hopeful for the world because just look at how much the people have come out to help these different Black businesses. The power is really coming back to the people. I feel like for once in this world, we’re really fighting for it.

G: It’s like a proper uprising.

M: There’s a vast acknowledgement by white people of their privileges as well. Honestly, that has benefitted me a lot, off the back of Black Lives Matter, even though it shouldn’t, but it has made me a lot more comfortable to work in spaces that are predominantly white –

G: And speak your mind.I also second that I’m hopeful for the world.

M: Not too sure about my career!

Interview: Jemima Skala | Photos: Melanie Lehmann | Creative Direction, Set Design and Styling: Innes Woo | Set Design and Styling Assistant: Sonia Trefilova | Hair and Makeup: Karla Leon