Beyoncé's Nephew Julez Smith Details Sweet Bond with Cousin Rumi Carter
Julez Smith likes being the big cousin.
Beyoncé and Jay-Z’s nephew—the only son of Beyoncé’s sister Solange Knowles and her ex Daniel Smith—detailed how his relationship with the couple’s youngest daughter Rumi has changed since he’s gotten older.
“My baby cousin Rumi, I seen her not too long ago, before I went to Paris actually, and I was packing my bag and she was like, ‘Where are you going?’” Julez, 20, explained in an interview with Teen Vogue published Feb. 13. “I was like, ‘I'm going to Paris.’ She was like, ‘Oh, you're going to work.’ And that was my first time where any of my cousins or siblings was like, ‘Okay, yeah, he got a job now. My cousin's going to work.’”
Rumi, 7, isn’t the only one of Julez’s cousins who gives him snark. Julez noted that Rumi’s twin Sir, and 13-year-old Blue Ivy also make him feel grown up.
“They’re asking me questions like, ‘You drive now?’” he continued. “And I'm like, ‘Yeah, I'm 20 now. I ain't the same 15-year-old when you were born, you feel me.’”
But the model doesn’t mind his place in his family, “that type of stuff warms my heart,” he continued, “just knowing that my younger folks in my family look up to me and I'm a role model to them.”
And he also emphasized the responsibility of being a role model for his younger family members, saying he’s been in “protector mode” since Blue Ivy was born.
“Just trying to be a positive role model as they get older—I think that's been my main goal,” Julez continued. “And it's cool, they know their cousin is a model now, so it's like, all right, that might rub off on one of the kids. I'm really close to my family, so being the oldest is like, I got to set the tone, set the standard for them, make sure I'm in the same direction that I would want them to go.”
Of course, Julez isn’t the only one setting a precedent for the next generation of his family. Blue Ivy, for her part, dedicated herself to performing alongside her mom on the Renaissance tour, a commitment that made both of her parents extremely proud.
“Blue is fearless,” Beyoncé said in the Renaissance: A Film By Beyoncé documentary. “What I love the most is she becomes fearless, and I can see the growth and the confidence and her trusting herself more and more.”
By Olivia Evans
