Harry Styles has explained why he was in the crowd in St. Peter’s Square in Rome when the new Pope was introduced to the world.
The As It Was singer stuns fans when he was spotted among the spectators in the famed Vatican City square when Pope Leo XIV made his first appearance as the new leader of the Catholic Church on the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica on 8 May last year.
During a virtual appearance on BBC Radio 1’s Breakfast Show on Friday, Harry explained that he was coincidentally having his hair cut in Rome when the historic moment took place.
“I was getting a haircut in Rome. Then I just heard all these people start shouting, ‘Habemus Papam! Habemus Papam!’ (Latin for ‘We have a Pope!’) and people just started running down the street,” he recalled.
“So the guy cutting my hair, stopped cutting my hair, and he was like, ‘Habemus Papam! There’s a new Pope, there’s a new Pope!’ So then we finished up. And then I was like, ‘Oh, I’m like a five-minute walk from (the square)’, so I walked over there. It was wild.”
Harry tried to go incognito by wearing a cap and sunglasses, but he was spotted by an eagle-eyed fan, who posted the snap on social media and it swiftly went viral, with many people wondering why he was there.
After more than two years out of the spotlight, the former One Direction star made his return on Friday with the release of Aperture, the first single from his next album, Kiss All The Time. Disco, Occasionally.
Speaking on the Capital Breakfast radio show, Harry explained that he needed time off to pay “more attention to some of the other corners of (his) life” that he’d neglected during his two-year Love on Tour trek.
“So, I think for me it was a really important couple of years for me personally to kind of honestly just fall in love with music all over again and to kind of understand why being in a crowd is so special to people,” he continued.
To support the album, which will be released on 6 March, the 31-year-old will embark on the Together, Together tour between May and December. He will perform 50 shows in seven cities, including 30 nights at New York City’s Madison Square Garden and six nights at London’s Wembley Stadium.
