Did they or didn’t they? The Olsen twins have been beloved by TV viewers everywhere since their star-making turns on Full House — and Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen have also been the subject of plastic surgery speculation since they were teens. Have they gone under the knife? Here’s what we know.
Neither Mary-Kate, 34, nor Ashley, 34, have spoken out about getting any procedures done over the years. In 2014, fans questioned whether or not Mary-Kate had gone under the knife after photos of her seemingly altered appearance surfaced after an event. However, other fans came to the designer’s defense at the time and noted that the girls are fraternal, not identical, twins — which could explain some of the differences that could be mistaken for surgery.
According to Miami plastic surgeon Dr. Rian Maercks, who has not treated the twins, the differences in their appearances may be due to smoking, not surgery. “I would say that technically the majority of the changes we see could be due to accelerated aging associated with nicotine products, tobacco, or other environmental factors, as [Mary-Kate] is a known smoker,” he previously told Life & Style.
Surgery or not, the former actresses have changed a lot since their days as child stars. The California natives are now fashion moguls and owners of high-end brands The Row and Elizabeth and James — and they have each reflected on their pasts since leaving Hollywood behind.
“I look at old photos of me, and I don’t feel connected to them at all,” Mary-Kate told Marie Claire in 2010. “I would never wish my upbringing on anyone … [We were] little monkey performers.” Ashley’s outlook on their past was a bit more positive. “I am so proud of what we did,” she said the following year. “We made kids smile every day. But we had done the most we could do.”
Following a massive career in children’s films and TV shows, the twins retired from acting at age 18. They went on to attend New York University together and ended up becoming leaders in the fashion world.
“They came to New York and wanted to go to college,” their former publicist, Michael Pagnotta, previously told People. “They’d been kind of hamster-wheeling their lives, and through the first year of college, when they got to NYU, they actually met people who had a different take on the world. They maybe got a different sense of what their future might be. And maybe it wouldn’t necessarily be in acting.”