Jennifer Lawrence seems like the very picture of confidence and taste. She leads a film franchise that is three installments in and making bank. The Hunger Games was a hit book series, but with Lawrence they are so big that they are going to live performances.

Then came her Oscar turn in Silver Linings Playbook, and the maturity of American Hustle. Lawrence seems like a woman in charge and on the A list everywhere.

But it was not always so.

I hated my first dress for red carpets,” she told Madame Figaro magazine in an interview accompanying her cover photo shoot, “because I never felt comfortable in these glamorous dresses. In Louisville, when I was a child, I inherited clothes my two older brothers (Ben and Blaine, Ed) that my mother unearthed in yard sales. I was a tomboy. It is only recently that I discovered the beauty of high fashion and big houses. The first Dior Raf Simons I attended I was blown away. Suddenly, I wanted to look like the definition of women wearing these pieces of art.

Lawrence also revealed that she initially was not sure that The Hunger Games was right for her.

“I hesitated three long days before accepting Hunger Games,” the actress said.” I dreamed of independent films. I was afraid of being identified as a prominent character for young people. At 20, one is rarely faced with a decision that will have such an impact on their future.”

Lawrence says she is not one to fuss about her “brand” as a celebrity. And she does not court the tabloids, though they seem to follow her everywhere, even prying into her private relationships.

“It does not interest me a second! I have hundreds of emails late! I always had a very clear idea of the course to which I aspired: acting, that’s all. Unfortunately I can not control my presence in the tabloids”