DJ-slash-skater Charlotte Frimpong on how to find your groove

Charming people.

This is the first in a new series titled Charming People, where we ask creatives we love about their journey to finding and expressing their own unique selves. It is made in partnership with Pandora Me, a new collection of miniature Pandora charms, earrings and carriers designed to help you better express yourself. 

“I usually wear dull colours, but every once in a while I’ll be like, ‘You know what? I’m feeling a bit colourful today.”

And just like that, human sartorial mood-ring, Charlotte Frimpong, and her patent cherry red jacket kicked off with a bang.

In partnership with Pandora’s new Pandora Me collection, we shot and spoke with four local women about what self-expression and confidence means to them. While the other interviewees – all unique 20-somethings a few years out of uni – detailed their professional journeys and spoke about the things they’d painstakingly learnt throughout the years, we loved Charlotte for her youthful, to-the-point outlook.

The 19-year-old DJ describes herself as as a “sort-of skater” on the side of her musical digs, the latter of which she has only been doing for a little while. The blessing of being 19 is that you only have “a little while” in the back pocket to have done things in.

“I’ve only been DJ-ing for a year now, but it’s been amazing. Given the endless archive of music out there, I experience this bliss when I share my curations with other people. It’s become my passion now.”

And much like the clothes she chose to wore to set today, sound-mixing is another medium for her to express her emotions. “The type of music I play when I’m DJ-ing is constantly evolving, so it reflects the pace I’m moving at in my life at that moment.”

Charlotte grew up in the southeast of Melbourne’s outer suburbs, and it remains a really important place to her. “We call it ‘The Areaz’ [but] it’s pretty much white surburbia,” she laughs. “But I have a real good group of friends from all different ethnic backgrounds and walks of life. It’s somewhere I can go back to and escape.”

Much like the contrasts of her wardrobe and the variety of her music, Charlotte’s personality is a healthy mix of a whole lot of things.

“I’m an extrovert but also an introvert,” she explains. “Sometimes I literally just sit there and don’t do anything. I just sit in complete silence. I’m not even thinking about anything, I’m just staring.”

This is, in her words, “just flourishing”. To Charlotte, self-expression is “being able to do you without the pressure of other people’s opinions.”

It’s enviable but inspiring to hear that kind of composure coming from someone who is just at the beginning of everything. Charlotte essentially kickstarted her DJ career by thinking “that would be cool” and hustling until she made it.

“It just kind of happened,” she said, and it’s hard to believe that isn’t true.

If, like us, you’d like to inject that kind of breeze into your own life, here are a few gems we pulled from our time with Charlotte, straight from the Frimpong School of Life.

“You can’t run before you walk. You’ve got to walk there.”

Whether you’re talking competence or confidence, there’s no way to bypass the journey. Charlotte really stressed the point, while every other interviewee on set came back to the same message in one way or another: personal development is a lifelong process.

“Recognise that you can be the boss bitch you want to be, and nobody can stop you.”

It sounds too simple. Like you decide that you’re going to be confident and successful, and voilà. But there is something to be said for stepping out of your own way and embracing opportunities. That seems to be Charlotte’s perspective on everything, be it learning to skate, making a new connection, or taking the next step in your career: “You just have to do it.”

Surround yourself with people you vibe with

“Being surrounded by people that have goals and are flourishing as people, it kind of makes you go, ‘Oh shit, I should be doing something as well.’” Basically, nobody gets anywhere without support or inspiration. Charlotte’s advice was to actively curate your social circle to soak up as much of both as possible.

“Everything that’s already been done, and already happened, is an amazing source of inspiration.”

There’s a lot of pressure for those in creative industries to always be doing something original or life-changing. But Charlotte sees it differently, describing the past as a pool of worldly knowledge, or a springboard for her own work.“I just think of ways I can do those things in a new, inventive sort of way.”

“Social media is a representation of everyone’s best self.”

In other words, Instagram is just Instagram. “There’s an amazing side to it where you can meet new people and express yourself,” says Charlotte. “But then there’s the darker side where people shy away from real issues.” Whether it be via clicktivism or the shallowness of ‘likes’ that mask real issues, there is a tendency to end up creating very specific versions of ourselves that are easy to digest. For Charlotte, recognising that alleviates a lot of pressure and changes how we can navigate these connections. 

“It’s cliché, but you really can’t care about what people think of you.”

Charlotte quite literally slapped a hand on the table as she said this, as if to emphasise the point. “It’s been said a lot of times. But it’s been said a lot of times because it’s true.”

Charlotte wears bracelets, charms and earrings from the Pandora Me collection, which is now available at Pandora stores and online. Browse and shop the full collection here and read about our other Charming People here.

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Styling credits

LOOK ONE
HANSEN AND GRETEL TANK, MODEL’S OWN PANTS AND SHOES, PANDORA ME BRACELETS, CHARMS AND EARRINGS

LOOK TWO
MODEL’S OWN TOP, SKIRT AND SHOES, PANDORA ME BRACELETS, CHARMS AND EARRINGS

LOOK THREE
MATT FINISH T-SHIRT, STAN RAY PANTS, MODEL’S OWN JACKET, PANDORA ME BRACELETS, CHARMS AND EARRINGS