Blake Lively might be shunning fashion trends, but at least she’s having fun
These days, celebrity stylists are almost as famous as the stars they dress; and rightly so, given the spoils that can be derived from being an excellent dresser. Without Law Roach – a man so exalted that he eschews the “s” word and refers to himself as an “image architect” – Zendaya may never have become a Louis Vuitton ambassador. Anne Hathaway, meanwhile, may not have secured a similar deal with Versace, had she not polished up her look with the help of stylist Erin Walsh.
If A-listers and stylists go together like cats and cream, Blake Lively is a different animal entirely. Long beloved for her “girl next door” beauty, the 36-year-old actress really is as relaxed and low-maintenance as she appears. She doesn’t even use a stylist, a fact that is highly unusual for someone at her level of fame.
As a busy starlet, Vogue cover star (fronting no less than the much-coveted September issue) and mother of four children under 10, Lively has more cause to employ a stylist than many of her peers. A-lister or accountant, we would all love a little help in the wardrobe department. It’s hard enough choosing an outfit for a late summer wedding, never mind a gruelling press tour with the eyes of the world upon us, poised to annihilate us for the slightest sartorial slip.
But as her most recent red carpet appearances prove, Blake Lively is having the time of her life. At the New York premiere of her new film It Ends With Us, she wore a rainbow-hued Versace dress that less confident dressers would have rejected for looking OTT. But it’s arguably one of her greatest charms that she flies above the parapet of this season’s trends, rejecting catwalk edicts about print, trouser shape and hue. Minimalism? Lively doesn’t know her. Instead, she embraces sequins, frills and bows with the wild enthusiasm of a five-year-old.
But it would be a mistake to equate her childlike exuberance with any sort of naivety. So savvy was her choice of Versace dress that it’s tempting to imagine there is a stylist in the wings, quietly issuing instructions from a walk-in closet. Hailing from Donatella’s Spring/Summer 2003 collection, the dress was first worn by Britney Spears in 2002. When you’re playing Lily Bloom, the resilient, romantic and much-loved heroine from Colleen Hoover’s bestselling novel (on which It Ends With Us is based on), there can be no more apposite icon to channel than Britney. As Lively wasted no time in pointing out on Instagram, Spears is “the ultimate queen who made us all want to sparkle and write and share our stories.”
Stylist or not (she’s said to have briefly worked with Micaela Erlanger in the past), Lively has recently been indulging in some “method dressing” of her own. Her character Lily Bloom’s profession? A florist: the perfect excuse to break out not one but 10 different floral looks. Of course, she cares not a whit that florals aren’t “groundbreaking,” and have been deemed irresolutely “out” this season. If Blake likes it, she wears it. It’s this same prioritising of personal choice over any uptight consideration of fashion’s so-called rule book that led her to step out in a sugar-pink satin corset dress last week, long after the Barbie ship had sailed. Where other actresses – and their stylists – have studiously avoided hot pink on the basis that it peaked long before Barbie was released last July, Lively embraces it. Forget any well-worn fashion rules: the only edict pinned on Lively’s mood board is: “Does it make me feel good?”
Still, it would be erroneous to suggest that she has no help at all. There may be no stylist on her payroll, but you don’t get to cover Vogue (or become one of Anna Wintour’s favourite actresses) without building up a Rolodex to rival Kate Moss. Judging by her recent looks, Lively definitely has a strong working relationship with blue chip brands such as Chanel, Michael Kors, Oscar de la Renta and Christian Dior (she wore a vintage Dior suit from 1997 on her current press tour). But she equally likes to give airtime to lesser-known brands, such as Dauphinette and Christopher John Rogers. She’s also generous in sharing the love, frequently crediting or tagging her hair and makeup teams.
Given a stylist would typically take weeks to call in clothes for a red carpet event, and several days working with their client on fittings, Lively’s refusal to use one isn’t exactly destined to ease her already considerable workload. For the stylist Shelly Vella, it indicates how comfortable she is in her own skin. “I’m always inspired by celebrities who have the confidence to collate their own press tour wardrobes. Blake Lively never looks like she’s worn by the clothes – her style is effortless and seems to find real joy in fashion, and has an instinctive sense of what looks good on her. There is nothing worse than a full stylist rail that doesn’t correspond with what you actually want to wear, or how you feel on that day.
She continued: “The choice not to have a stylist is smart and stylish in its own right. It also demonstrates a real interest in fashion that she knows exactly what she wants, and where to get it.”
While purists might cringe at her love of mermaid dresses, ruching, handkerchief hems, toadstool handbags and jarring, off-menu colours, Lively is unlikely to care. “It’s not ever lost on me that I get to play dress-up for a living,” she enthusiastically told her 45.3 million Instagram followers. Like Taylor Swift, she wears things for the love of them, not the labels. Unlike Swift, she’s not divisive. Most women with the good fortune to have a stellar acting career, four children and the blind devotion of Ryan Reynolds (her doting husband of 12 years) would attract at least a modicum of resentment online. But trolls are there few. Lively is quite singularly popular – no mean feat, given the public appetite for taking down anyone who seems to have it all.
While Lively’s likeability is innate, it’s also projected through her wardrobe. What’s more likeable than an A-lister who chooses their own clothes? And if she gets it “wrong” sometimes, any missteps only serve to make her more relatable. In her new Vogue profile, her friend Hugh Jackman describes Lively as “someone who is comfortable in their own skin,” adding, ‘you can’t make that happen. You can’t bestow it on someone”. In a world of increasingly homogenized style, she’s her own person – toadstool handbags and all.
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