While the world eagerly awaits her new music, Lorde took some time recently to make a significant donation to a New Zealand children’s charity. Posting under her given name (Ella Yelich-O’Connor) on a fundraising page for the Fuel The Need charity, the “Royals” singer wrote on Wednesday, “Good on you Manuel and Fuel the Need — hope this helps a little bit. Lots of love from a former kid who is passionate about all kids having access to food at school.”
The $14,500 donation ($20,000 NZ) to the organization that helps provide lunches for children who don’t otherwise have access to food was a big help to the organization, according to founder Manuel Dalton. “All sleepy eyed I looked at my notifications and saw one from Givealittle and had to do a double take at seeing $20,000,” he told Stuff. “I wasn’t aware who Ella Yelich-O’Connor was and when people told me it was Lorde, I said ‘gosh, oh my Lord’.”
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Dalton said each meal costs $3 and the project was looking to raise $30,000 over the course of the school year, but that he didn’t want to commit to it until he had at least half of the funding. “The last thing I wanted to do was in a month or two stop because we’ve got no more money,” he said. At press time the drive had raised nearly $25,000 from 42 donors. A spokesperson for Lorde could not be reached at press time to confirm the donation.
Lorde has been hard at work on the follow-up to her smash 2013 debut, Pure Heroine, posting earlier this week that “it’s summer in the studio too” and, a week before, that she and collaborator Jack Antonoff “really crushed it at work this week.”
brats at the concession stand / we really crushed it at work this week pic.twitter.com/pOoruF6pbf
— Lorde (@lorde) June 15, 2016