Taylor Swift Fans Are All Asking The Same Question About "Cornelia Street"
Taylor Swift's Lover has finally arrived. As is always the case when Swift drops a new album, her loyal band of fans have begun developing their own theories as to what each song could mean. Most of the songs are easy to crack: they're about Joe Alwyn, her boyfriend of three years. But there's one detail in one of the songs about Alwyn that fans are questioning: Is Cornelia Street real? She named a whole song after it, after all.
Track No. 9 on Swift's album is all about her time renting an apartment or home. In the lyrics, Swift sings, "I rent a place on Cornelia Street, I sit casually in the car." That line has fans wondering if she actually revealed the street she lived on. Swift and Alwyn keep a famously private relationship, so that kind of reveal would probably classify as a big one in the eyes of the couple.
A quick Google Maps search reveals that yes, Cornelia Street is, indeed, real. There's a Cornelia Street in London — it's not too far from King's Cross Station and The British Museum, plopping it in a nice spot in the city. It's totally possible Swift used to rent a place on Cornelia Street in the early years of her and Alwyn's relationship. But, there also just happens to be a Cornelia Street in New York, and Swift actually rented an apartment there while her Tribeca home was being renovated. So, it's more than likely that the Cornelia Street she's singing about is the one in New York.
The main theme of this song is not wanting to lose "you." "You," in her case, would likely be Alwyn. (If she does, her lyrics say, she'll "never walk Cornelia Street again.") That's not really something you worry about three years into a relationship that, by all of Swift's accounts in her music about Alwyn from Reputation and Lover, seems joyous.
"I don't want to lose you" is more something you say when something is new. You're with them, things are official, but they're still ~delicate~. You're over-the-moon happy knowing what you have is good, then you start to fear the other shoe is about to drop. It's more of a first year of a relationship fear than anything else. It looks like Swift moved into Cornelia Street apartment in 2016, which just so happened to be around the same time that she started dating Alwyn.
"Cornelia Street" the song seems like Swift dug into her early Alwyn relationship memories/feelings and fleshed this particular one out into a song.
I bet Swifties are flocking to Cornelia Street in New York right now. Maybe Swift even set up some kind of surprise for them there? She did have an event outside at mural in Tennessee when she first started doing Lover press, so I wouldn't be surprised if something Swift-related goes down on Cornelia Street in the Lover era.
