Margot Robbie Belonged to a Surfer Girl Gang—And More Confessions From the Aussie Bombshell

Margot Robbie has a way of catching you off-guard. When the actress splashed onto the scene in The Wolf of Wall Street in 2013, the awestruck masses had to reconcile the fact that this brazen blonde with a spot-on Brooklyn accent hailed, in fact, from Australia. Since then, the 26-year-old has become known for breaking the screen-star mold. For one, she takes on as much work on-camera (The Legend of Tarzan and Suicide Squad this summer alone) as off, co-running a production company with a slate of upcoming projects, including Terminal, a thriller, and a Tonya Harding biopic. (Robbie, with a reputation for fearlessly doing much of her own stunt work, already has experience in skates, having played on an amateur ice hockey team a few years back in New York.) She also straddles the worlds of polish and rogue whimsy, seeming as comfortable exuding Grace Kelly–esque glamour on the red carpet as she is inking fellow cast members on-the-fly with her tattoo gun.

With her latest role as the face of Calvin Klein’s Deep Euphoria fragrance campaign, she also brings a layered perspective—as a woman who embodies both sensuality and free-spirited power, and as an actress for whom perfume is a very real tool for character work. Here, she speaks with Vogue.com about the scents that have accompanied her on set, her early days as part of a tribe of all-girl surfers, and her beauty favorites, from her go-to trainer in Los Angeles to a bucolic spa outside of London.

You’re calling from London. Is that still where you call home?
Yeah, I’m shooting a movie here at the moment, so it’s nice to stay put for a minute. It’s about A.A. Milne, the author of the Winnie-the-Pooh series, and I play his wife, Daphne. It’s a beautiful, beautiful film. I’m really enjoying it.

Calvin Klein has such a history with epoch-defining campaigns and fragrances. What were your earliest memories of the brand?
My earliest memories were the black-and-white photos of Kate Moss and Mark Wahlberg. I just thought it was so cool. Calvin Klein kind of made the ’90s; they have a way of making classic things seem modern. And a lot of women in my family have worn Calvin Klein [perfumes], so it’s a scent that’s been dotted throughout my childhood.

What scents take you back to your childhood in Australia? Are there iconic perfumes you wore, or was it more about the beach and sunscreen and eucalyptus?
The smell of the beach and the smell of the thunderstorm—all those kinds of things definitely make me feel at home. At my house growing up, we had lavender bushes and jasmine; I can smell a bit of jasmine and rose in this perfume, so, yeah, they’re the sort of scents that take me back to my childhood. When I was a little girl, I remember every time I’d hug my auntie or my mom, they had a certain scent. I remember thinking, “I can’t wait until I’m old enough to wear perfume, and I’ll have my scent, too.”

How does perfume fold into your daily life, on-camera or off? I know some actors incorporate scent into their character work.
I actually do—I always pick a perfume for each character I play. I try to keep it specific to that character, and only when I walk on set do I wear it. I find it extremely helpful. For the character I’m playing right now [Daphne Milne]—it’s set in the 1920s and 1930s—I found this beautiful perfume; it’s a more obscure one, not a well-known brand, but the bottle looks like it’s from the era. I asked about the scent, and the guy was like, “It smells like Greta Garbo, just swanning her way through a hotel in the 1920s.” And I was like, “That’s exactly what I’m after!” For Tarzan, when I played Jane, I wore pure rose oil because it felt delicate and earthy to suit the character. And when I played Harley [Quinn, in Suicide Squad], I picked something kind of tacky and sickly sweet, just a bit overbearing and in your face; I bought it from a strip mall in America. In the film I did before this one, Terminal, I was playing a femme fatale, this kind of dangerous, quirky, complicated woman, and as we did the shoot for the [Deep Euphoria] campaign, I was like, “Wow, this perfume is perfect for that.” So it ended up being my scent for that character.

I hear you were a total water baby growing up. Did you have a favorite beach or surf haunt?
Yeah, I did. I used to live in Currumbin Valley, which is up in the mountains, but if you go directly toward the coast you hit a surf spot called the Alley. It’s protected, so the waves are always calm and nice. We used to go every weekend and surf. It was about the time that Blue Crush came out, and that was our biggest inspiration of those years. We’d be there at the Alley every weekend, wanting to be these badass chick surfers. It was an all-girl gang.

Did that upbringing help lay the groundwork for your fearlessness with stunts?
Probably. Where I grew up in Australia, it’s super-outdoorsy. You’re always jumping off cliffs and riding motorbikes and doing that kind of stuff, so the stunt work is extremely fun for me.

As an adopted Londoner, what are your go-to beauty and health spots in the city?
Despite the fact that I’ve been here for over two years now, I’m not so up with that sort of stuff. I usually just ask my girlfriends; Cara [Delevingne] and Suki [Waterhouse] are my little black books! I recently went out to Soho Farmhouse, which is about an hour and a half outside of London, and it’s literally the most relaxing place on earth. They’ve got the Cowshed Spa out there; it was amazing. And there’s this brand, 111Skin. I recently got a facial there, and their products are incredible. My makeup artist turned me on to them.

Has London, with its signature dreary rain, imparted any beauty lessons?
It’s actually been really good for my skin to be living here. The sun is just so harsh in Australia, especially since we don’t really have the ozone layer that you get elsewhere, and I’ve noticed that my skin has totally changed. At this age—I’m 26 now—sun damage is becoming so evident, and as you start worrying about getting wrinkles and sunspots, I’m really grateful I’m on the other side of the world.

L.A. is in your future, yes? What are you most looking forward to?
Yeah, we’ll make the move later in the year. I see Andie Hecker—she is an amazing trainer. I love being able to see her in L.A., although in London there’s another amazing trainer, David Higgins. He’s an Aussie, too; he does Pilates, personal training. That’s my go-to form of exercise. In L.A. it’s so easy to eat healthy and be healthy, and there are all these bizarre methods of looking your best, which sometimes is helpful when you’re trying to get in shape; it’s also kind of nice to be removed from that sometimes. I’m looking forward to L.A.—it’s a much shorter flight to get home!

What about your tattoo prowess? Is the hobby still going strong, and have you been leaving your mark on anyone interesting lately?
I don’t know about prowess! It’s kind of like a party trick more than an actual skill. I ran out of tattoo supplies for a while, so I stopped for a little bit—which is probably the safer thing because I think we were getting a bit carried away! People forget that it’s going to be stuck on them forever, and they really do prove to be very open to the idea, which is kind of funny. I just topped up my supplies, so I’m ready to leave my mark on some new victims, I suppose [laughs]. But I do try to explain to people that I’m not actually a tattoo artist, so think long and hard!

 

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