AfriPulse
Alysa Liu, a 20-year-old figure skater from the Bay Area city of Richmond in California, isn’t just a two-time gold medalist at the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics. The women’s singles and team champion also captured the hearts of spectators around the world with her IDGAF vibe, a charisma and coolness that stands in opposition to the straight-laced image presented by many in the sport, as well as the unsmiling focus one might expect from an athlete that competes at the Olympic level.
Alysa Liu
WANG ZHAO/Getty Images
Alysa Liu joined Team United States just four years after she retired from skating at age 16. “I started skating when i was 5 so that’s about 11 years on the ice and it’s been an insane 11 years. a lot of good and a lot of bad,” she wrote in a 2022 Instagram post.
“I feel so satisfied with how my skating career has gone. now that i’m finally done with my goals in skating i’m going to be moving on with my life,” she concluded. But just two years later she was back on the ice. “It was good for me to take time off from skating, and I am beyond excited to begin skating again with my newly found perspective,” she said then.
As she settled back into the sport, her look slowly evolved into the one that’s recently taken over the internet. First, the striped blond and brown hair, the handiwork of St. Louis stylist Kelsey Miller, reports KSDK. The five-hour process to create the halo hair look has already been requested by other clients visiting Miller’s salon.
Alysa Liu. (Photo by Joosep Martinson/Getty Images) Joosep Martinson/Getty Images
Then there’s her frenulum piercing, seen in photos as a piece of jewelry that extends through through the underside of her upper lip. Speaking with NBC, Liu explained that she did the piercing herself. “I had my sister hold up my lip, and I was looking in the mirror, and I had my piercing needle,” she said of the procedure from around two years ago. The home job was motivated by cost, she said in a 2024 podcast interview. “Getting pierced at a shop is really expensive for no reason,” she said, “so I thought I’d learn it myself, be a little DIY-girl.”
Liu’s willingness to walk away from the sport and her devil-may-care attitude about her look has inspired social media excitement, such as an X post saying “alisa liu being the first woke idgafer alt baddie to win an olympic gold medalist.…THAT’S how you make america great again.”
Part of that attitude is Liu’s refusal to compromise. “These titles are huge, but I don’t want them to overshadow who I am and what I do and what I am all about,” Liu said after winning her gold medal. “Winning isn’t all that, and neither is losing.”
“Through retirement, I realized I am a little bit like a creative person, and I have these ideas. I have my own sense of fashion and I’m a little bit stubborn with it. I love choreography and music, and I do it on my own terms. No one tells me what to do.”
Alysa Liu
WANG ZHAO/Getty Images
Alysa Liu
GABRIEL BOUYS/Getty Images
Originally published in Vanity Fair Italy
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