Even before she became a newly minted Olympic gold medalist this week, gymnast Jordan Chiles had a good feeling headed into Paris for this year’s Games. Sure enough, her gut was spot on: The 23-year-old and her fellow Team USA gymnasts Simone Biles, Sunisa Lee, Jade Carey, and Hezly Rivera collected gold medals in the women’s artistic gymnastics team final on Tuesday. If you looked closely enough, the celebratory mood extended right down to the glinting surface of Chiles’s teeth, which held a pair of custom grills she’d had made back in Houston for the occasion.
“I got them done before I left and, you know, I was like, What if we win a gold medal?” Chiles tells GQ, speaking by phone from Paris early Thursday. “I had really good faith in us that we were gonna win a gold medal. So I was like, you know what, I’m gonna just bring them with me.”
The 2024 Olympics have already produced a handful of viral style moments, a phenomenon for which Black American women athletes have long set the precedent. (Especially relative to, say, the corniness of American swimmer Ryan Locthe wearing a Paul Wall-designed grill on the Olympic podium in 2012.) From record-smashing sprinter Sha’Carri Richardson’s patriotic acrylics to tennis champ Coco Gauff’s braids streaked with red, white, and blue, this year’s Games are no different.
And inside Bercy Arena on Tuesday, in the heart of the French capital, Chiles was a gloriously American sight: a Black gymnast with her slicked-back bun, gold-flecked acrylic nails, and gleaming diamond grill, beaming proudly on the Olympic podium.
As she gears up to compete again in the floor event on Monday, the gold medalist chatted about her Beyoncé grill inspo (she also wore a Renaissance-inspired leotard in the U.S. Gymnastics Championships back in June), getting iced out in Texas, and the style moves she still has left up her sleeve.
Jordan Chiles: Honestly, I'm feeling really good. I'm proud of my team, I'm proud of everybody that was able to go out there and do what they need to do. Now it's just the next steps: cheering on my teammates [Biles and Lee] in all-around, and everything after that and the finals and all that, so I’m really excited.
I got them done before I left and, you know, I was like, What if we win a gold medal? I had really good faith in us that we were gonna win a gold medal. So I was like, you know what, I'm gonna just bring them with me. It was more of a fashion statement for me because I was like, I'm gonna have them with me, I'm probably gonna go do stuff in Paris. You know, this is just Jordan. I was like, You know what, I'm gonna stand on the podium with that gold medal around my neck and I'm gonna have my grills in and see what people say. It was kind of just like me going with the flow of everything. Again, I like fashion a lot, so I felt like in that moment, why not put a fashion piece in my mouth? [Laughs.] Gold and gold, it went well.
No, yeah, I got them made. I always wanted ever since I was younger, so when I finally got to the point where I could do it. Everybody—my family, my friends—were like, ‘Oh my gosh, that would be so cool.’
I told my teammates, I think, the day of. I told Suni [Lee] like either the night or the day of us competing, and I was like, “Suni, I'm gonna put these in.” She was like, “No, you're not.” I said, “Yeah,” and she was like, “That's gonna look so good.” I was like, “I hope it does.” [Laughs.] I hope people don't think I'm being crazy or anything like that.
I had them made in Houston [by] this guy, his name is Jimmy Boi. I met him at a Texas playoff game and he was like, “I would love to do a piece for you.” I reached out to him before I left [and] he was like, “Yeah, I'll get everything sorted out.” So it was really cool having him help me with that. He’s a really dope dude, not gonna lie. He got all it done for me.
Yes, literally the mold of my teeth, which I have pictures of and all that. I have a video of me getting my mold that I'll probably post later.
Originally I was gonna try to have Olympic rings made, but I was like, I want this to be something that I can wear for the rest of my life, not just like a once-in-a-lifetime thing. With the design, [I got] the bottom piece of it [because] I didn't want it to look too manly, because I'm a girl so I wanted it to be really girly. But also I do sometimes have that hard body in me, so I was like, “How can I bling it out?”
My best friend was like, “Oh my gosh, what if you do a little heart or something and bling out one whole tooth?” I've always wanted just the bottom bar. Like, I've never wanted a full, long grill grill because again, I wanted it to be more girly than manly.
Yes! The bottom grill, the inspo pic I got was from Beyoncé. When she released her Cowboy Carter [album], just any photo that she posted with her grill in her mouth up close, you can see that her bottom teeth have the bar, so that caught my eye. And then the heart on my upper piece, it definitely came from Pinterest. I was looking every single day.
Oh, one-hundred percent.
Not necessarily, I didn't really think of it that way. I mean, yes, everybody in Texas has grills or has a really cool, dope necklace or whatever it is. It was more so something I've always wanted. But I think it's pretty cool how everybody's like, ‘Oh, my gosh, it brings out the Blackness in Jordan.’ I'm like, ‘You guys are hilarious.’ Because, I’m not going to lie, that is a Black thing that somebody would have done.
Yeah, it's really cool. We all have different personalities within the group, so [it’s] showing each other who we are and what we've done and putting it all together and out onto the competition floor. My personality is that I'm the hype girl, trying to get everybody excited doing everything that they love…before coming together and putting on a show because that's what it's really all about. Our personality is definitely out there. A lot of people know about it. [Laughs.]
I am going to Disney [in Paris], so I'll probably have some really cool outfit over there. As of right now, there's only so much that we can do because we still are in the Village. I do have a necklace that got made for me as well, it's Michael Jordan's number 23 that I'll probably wear at some point. [Editor’s note: Jordan Chiles was named after Michael Jordan.] But other than that, my nails, my makeup, my hair, those are all fashion statements for who I am. For [my] floor [event on Monday], who knows what I'll end up doing, maybe a really cool makeup look. I just say keep a look out because you never know what Jordan can pull out. I be doing some crazy things.
My teammates are competing so I'll probably be watching them. Training still. We don't really get weekends off because our competitions are back to back to back. And then I go with my family, have an amazing time, get out of Paris, and then head to the next destination. … I love being able to cheer on my teammates. Everybody should be in good spirits, good vibes, you know, listening to music while getting ready.
We're all different, we all have different vibes when it comes to music. As of now, because Simone's been playing her music, we've been listening to a lot of just like R&B pop from Beyoncé, to Latto, to Megan [Thee Stallion], to City Girls. There's a lot on the playlist, so definitely been vibing out for sure. Getting hyped.
This interview has been edited and condensed.