Claire Elizabeth Cottrill (born August 18, 1998), known professionally as Clairo, is an American singer-songwriter. She rose to prominence following the release of her lo-fi song "Pretty Girl" (2017) on YouTube. Her professional debut was with the EP Diary 001 (2018), followed by her debut studio album Immunity (2019). Claire was born in Atlanta, Georgia, the daughter of marketing executive Geoff Cottrill, and grew up in Carlisle, Massachusetts. At the age of 13, she taught herself guitar from Internet tutorials, after which she began posting music to Bandcamp and SoundCloud, and maintained a YouTube channel where she posted covers and short films. After the popularity of "Pretty Girl", Clairo signed a record contract with the help of her family's connections with The Fader magazine. Her presentation of herself as a "do-it-yourself" artist was questioned amid some online controversy, which included her being labelled an "industry plant". She referred to the criticism as sexist.