Despite the fact that they kept their whirlwind romance under wraps, fans were still obsessed with Hailee Steinfeld and Niall Horan‘s past relationship.
The pair first met in 2017 after performing on the Jingle Ball Tour together, but romance rumors didn’t start swirling until January 2018. When the Pitch Perfect star was asked about the nature of her relationship with Niall during an interview with Us Weekly, she declined to divulge any details.
“I feel so lucky that [my fans] care enough about me to know what I’m doing every second of every day, but I think that sometimes it’s hard for people, in general, to realize that there are boundaries to a person’s life and personal life,” Hailee said at the time.
After a little over a year together, the two went their separate ways. Following their short-lived love story, the pair wrote a few songs about each other, and Hailee seemingly shaded the One Direction member multiple times.
“Toward the beginning of the pandemic, I released that EP and was very proud because I felt like I had articulated this pain I was feeling that at one point, I felt like I couldn’t put into words,” Hailee explained to Cosmopolitan in November 2021 of her Half Written Story EP. “What I was going through was like, ‘I don’t wanna talk about this. I don’t want people to know.’ I felt that all I had to do was write it and then nothing had to happen after that if I didn’t want it to. I had my little angry, sad girl moment. That was kind of all I needed to get back on track to make music that makes me want to dance and feel good.”
When it comes to new relationships, Hailee told Cosmo that she is looking for “a partner who is, first and foremost, loyal and honest but confident in themselves and able to do their thing while I do mine.”
The Dickinson star continued: “It’s weird talking about it because it’s been in my head for so long. A lot of this music is also about taking control and taking ownership of one’s self. But I also think there’s power in claiming what you want, and maybe what you want is not to be alone.”
Scroll through our gallery for a complete timeline of Niall and Hailee’s relationship from start to finish, including the drama that followed.
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