As a gauge of pop stardom in Canada, having your face splashed across a nation’s worth of Tim Hortons coffee cups is probably the ultimate sign that you’ve made it to the top.

Amiable Pickering native Shawn Mendes returns to the GTA this week for a sold-out homecoming show at the Rogers Centre on Friday, at a moment when he’s attained perhaps the greatest cultural ubiquity he’ll ever enjoy in this country, appearing on Timmies cups from coast to coast and giving his suburban hometown some love in his very own TV commercial for the chain. It really doesn’t get any bigger than this, folks.

The 21-year-old chart-topper, currently riding high (again) with the inescapable single “Senorita” — a duet with maybe/maybe-not girlfriend Camila Cabello that became Mendes’s first No. 1 single on the Billboard Hot 100 this summer — has also used all the attention this trip home has been getting to wield his runaway popularity for good, announcing the formation last week of the Shawn Mendes Foundation. The charity, which has already raised some $1 million US in donations, aims to support causes that the singer’s young fan base holds dear and, as the singer put it in a news release, “to help provide them with a platform that inspires positive change” by asking them for suggestions as to where its money should be spent. Some of the proceeds from those coffee sales will go to the Shawn Mendes Foundation, as will all of the cash collected from the $40 Mendes ballcaps being sold at the Roots pop-up shop that went up inside an elaborate rose garden near the Rogers Centre this past Wednesday.

With all this going on, it’s not surprising that Mendes is a little short on time to talk with the media these days. He did, however, concede to do a brief email interview with the Star over the Labour Day weekend. And yes, his publicist swears on her life that it was indeed Mendes doing the typing.

Here is that harmless exchange in all its glory.

You’re coming home this week to play the biggest Canadian show of your life in your (sorta-) hometown in a 55,000-capacity stadium. How the hell does that feel?

It’s really incredible. I couldn’t have thought beyond my wildest dreams that I’d be playing stadiums as a headliner and to get to do the first one in my hometown is so amazing.

Also, at the same time that you’re coming home this week to play the biggest Canadian show of your life, your likeness is splashed across Tim Hortons cups all across the freakin’ country. How weird is that? And how does something like that even come to happen? Who approached who?

To have grown up going to Tim’s and now to have them come on to support and celebrate the homecoming stadium show in such a massive way like this is just unreal. We approached Tim’s over a year ago just wanting to find any way to work with them, and we knew we wanted to make a big splash around this week and we worked through ideas for the campaign for a year until it finally came to fruition.

To the outward observer, it feels like you kinda rocketed from nowhere to playing stadiums at a highly accelerated pace. I wonder how it feels to you from the inside. Has it been a whirlwind? I get the sense you haven’t paused to take a really deep breath in, like, six years.

It really has been a whirlwind, but you somewhat take things one day at a time and just try to enjoy every moment the best you can. I definitely barely have the time to really reflect on it, but being back in Toronto with my friends and family this week I’ve really been able to just take it in and am so grateful for all of it.

On a related note, you’re still a pretty young guy. I’m in my 40s now and I can’t imagine having to spend half my teenage years either working as hard as you have or having my photo splashed across the internet every time I leave the house. How the hell have you kept it together? A lot of people crumble under that kind of pressure.

I just try to do my best to stay grounded, keep my friends and family close to me and to make sure that no matter what, I always come home as the same person. It’s definitely a lot of pressure, but I work hard to stay in a good mindset, to stay healthy and to keep the right people around me that really motivate me and inspire me and that I love.

On another related note, is it extra-hard work having to deal with all the non-music nonsense that comes with pop stardom? It looks like a lot of work. I know you’ve talked about suffering from anxiety in the past; sometimes I get anxious on your behalf just looking at the degree of spotlight that’s cast on you.

Yeah, it’s definitely not easy and it comes along with a lot of pressure and sometimes it’s very hard to get through some of the anxieties around it all, but you learn to cope and deal with it the best you can. We’re all human and we all, no matter who we are, have good days and bad days.

Let’s talk about the Shawn Mendes Foundation. I know this isn’t your first charity endeavour, but what prompted you to take this next step? Was there a particular moment or incident that made you think “This is the right thing to do and I’m gonna do it now”?

It really came out of a conversation I had with my manager. We were talking about how I could give back more to my fans and also how I could help give them even more of a voice about the things they care about. I realized that, being their age — while I am not the expert in any field — what I can do is help my fans learn about the causes they’re passionate about by somewhat learning alongside them. The goal really is to identify causes important to me and my fans and amplify them.

I just did a feature on the music scene in Oshawa and Durham Region a few weeks ago — feel free to have a read — and, of course, Pickering is a part of that community. Do you have anything nice to say about your musical upbringing in the ’burbs? Durham does seem to punch above its weight in terms of pop exports. Why do you think so many successful artists have come out of your part of the world?

Yeah, it’s pretty amazing how many incredible musicians have come from the area. For me, I grew up in a household that just loved music. One of my dad’s best friends was a DJ, so growing up there was always music and dancing in the house. I also would say that we had some amazing music programs in high school.

OK, back to playing SkyDome: who is this a bigger thrill for? You or your family? I’m guessing it runs neck-and-neck.

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Ha-ha, that’s a tough one to answer. This is really just an insanely big moment for me, my family, my friends and my team and I hope I can share that energy with my hometown fans, too.

One more: new music? New album? Feel free to let some cats out of the bag here for the hometown paper ...

I will say I’m writing a ton lately and there are some exciting songs, but I’m taking my time to make sure what comes next is incredible. At the moment I’m focused on the tour and this homecoming show and then we take the tour overseas to Asia, Australia and South America, which I am so excited for.

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