It's the end of an era. According to reports, the Kardashian-Jenner family has cut ties with their longtime makeup artist, family friend, and beauty brand founder, Joyce Bonelli.
Bonelli has been working with the Kardashians since 2007, and helped perfect the early iterations of Kim's seriously contoured glam. But now, it seems that the fam has abruptly booted Bonelli from its notoriously tight inner circle — and there's a lot of speculation why.
According to "anonymous sources" speaking to Us Weekly, the Kardashians cut ties with Bonelli several months ago.
Per Us Weekly:
“The family doesn’t speak to her anymore,” the insider says. “She hasn’t worked for them for months."
The decision was made amicably, though. The source assures *Us, “*They just stopped working with her because they didn’t see it as a right fit anymore.”
I know what you're thinking; an unnamed source? OK, perhaps not that reliable. But consider the smoking gun — though Bonelli still follows all the Kardashian-Jenners on Instagram, NONE of them follow her back.
That may seem trivial, but Khloe and her sisters reserve the unfollow for only the gravest of insults. The Kardashians unfollowing former stylist Monica Rose was the first hint eagle-eyed detectives had that she had been 86'ed from the family.
But if there's bad blood, nobody told Bonelli. She's been posting throwback photos of herself with all the Kardashians, and seems to still wish them well.
Yes, that Khloe's glitter booty.
But when you're the artist responsible for kreating Kim's klassic smoky eye, wouldn't you brag on your work?
At the end of the day, this "split" may just be a case of powerful people who are not too busy to work together. The Kardashians have their own empire, and Joyce is a fashion designer who also founded her own beauty brand.
Being part of the inner Kardashian circle is basically a full-time job. It may just be that their schedules no longer aligned.
And it may also be that the Kardashians aggressively kurate (sorry, I'll stop) their follows. Kim follows primarily her IRL friends, the doctors (Dr. Ourian) and glam team members (Mario, Ariel) she's working with currently... but not many from her past.
But even *that's* weird, because in interviews, Joyce describes her relationship with the Kardashians as familial — she's not just the person who does their makeup.
In a 2017 interview, Bonelli said "I’ve been with the girls for so long and we’ve been through so much. It’s been over a decade. We’ve known each other since the beginning, before they were famous. After they started their show people started really loving them and then hating them and now they’re loving them again, there’s been so much that’s happened. Now each one of them is a phenomenon in their own way."
"We text every other day and we talk about everything. Even if I’m working with a different client we’re always talking and FaceTiming — we talk about kids, we talk about the fun, scandalous stuff. They’re like my sisters."
So if you're really like a sister to someone — or multiple someones — do you really unfollow them just because you're not working together anymore?
Me right now:
KRIS JENNER ALWAYS KNOWS.
And listen, I can't speak to what happened. Nobody really can. But longtime Kardashian fans are speculating, and the tea is SCALDING.
This theory — which is 100% speculation, to be very clear — is one that I've seen cited MULTIPLE times.
This is not the first time a high-profile member of the Kardashian glam squad has been dumped for mysterious reasons. Recall what happened with longtime stylist Monica Rose.
At the time, there were a million wild rumors about why Rose was fired. To this day, these remain speculation only — because the Kardashians know how to keep a secret.
But many stories speculated that Rose was let go because she was very comfortable with the press. Allegedly. There is no quicker way to get bounced from the Kardashian-Jenner world than to leak info to the media. Kris Jenner manages the narratives of her family with the finesse of a conductor, and derailing her finely-tuned machine with an unsanctioned rumor just CANNOT happen.
Allegedly, of course.
And it doesn't even matter if you didn't really tip off a tabloid. Even if it's just a rumor that you *might* be doing it, or you *might be thinking about it,* it's enough to get you iced out.
We may never know the reason — if any — behind this glam breakup.
But if Bonelli's "Fuck with me, I dare you" robe is any indication, this drama is only getting started.
I'll keep you updated on this story as more develops.
