Tom Hiddleston Says 'Of Course' Taylor Swift Romance Was Real, Explains Story Behind 'I Heart T.S.' Tank Top

Tom Hiddleston and Taylor Swift’s whirlwind relationship may have been questioned by some as “fake,” but the three-month romance was anything but that to the Golden Globe winner.

“Of course it was real,” Hiddleston, 35, shares in the March issue of GQ, appearing on its cover with a smoldering smile.

“Taylor Swift is an amazing woman,” he says of the 27-year-old songstress. “She’s generous and kind and lovely, and we had the best time.”

When the interviewer gives Hiddleston the chance to address a burning question most fans had of the former couple dubbed “Hiddleswift,” he jumped at the opportunity to explain why photos emerged of him wearing an “I heart T.S.” tank top at Swift’s annual Fourth of July bash at her Rhode Island home last year.

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“The truth is, it was the Fourth of July and a public holiday and we were playing a game and I slipped and hurt my back,” the handsome Brit says. “ And I wanted to protect the graze from the sun and said, ‘Does anyone have a T-shirt?’ And one of her friends said, ‘I’ve got this’ and we all laughed about it. It was a joke.”

“I have to be so psychologically strong about not letting other people’s interpretations about my life affect my life,” he continues.

Their inside joke left those on the outside wondering how Swift and Hiddleston’s relationship turned so apparently serious that he would declare his love for her on a piece of clothing just weeks after she split from longtime boyfriend Calvin Harris.

“A relationship exists between two people. We will always know what it was. The narratives that are out there altogether have been extrapolated from pictures that were taken without consent or permission, with no context” he explains. “Nobody had the context for that story. And I’m still trying to work out a way of having a personal life and protecting it, but also without hiding. So the hardest thing is that that was a joke among friends at Fourth of July.”

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“I don’t know,” he adds. “I just, I was surprised. I was just surprised that it got so much attention. The tank top became an emblem of this thing.”

Though Hiddleston doesn’t directly address Swift’s relationship past, he certainly didn’t hesitate to continue saying kind words about his ex.

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“I only know the woman I met. She’s incredible. A relationship in the limelight… A relationship always takes work. A relationship in the limelight takes work. And it’s not just the limelight. It’s everything else. So we decided to go out for dinner, we decided to travel.”

Travel they did to Rhode Island, Nashville, the U.K., Italy and Australia, and Hiddleston is left with no regrets.

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“Because you have to fight for love. You can’t live in fear of what people might say,” he shares.

“You know, you have to be true to yourself.”

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