Stars like Blake Lively and Sarah Jessica Parker are laughed at for their unusual clothing choices, and fashion critics are even horrified. In the series “Emily in Paris,” the offbeat looks are downright celebrated. When does bad taste turn from naivety into calculation?
Social media users have a lot of reasons to be angry about Blake Lively right now. The actress, whose new film “Just One More Time” was released two weeks ago, is being heavily criticized. She is said to have used the promotion for the film, which is about domestic violence, to advertise her brands of hair care products and ready-made cocktails. When asked about the serious content of the film, she responded with flippant remarks.
Another controversial topic is more likely to benefit Lively: the discussion about her strange style. It has been known for years that the actress does not employ an official stylist, but puts together her own outfits. During the promotional tour for “Just One More Time” it became clear why this is sometimes not a good idea. Lively wore a short red floral dress over yellow tights with leopard spots. Rainbow-colored feathers fluttered on an azure blue dress with an angel motif. And she combined jeans with black cowboy-style leather protectors with a shiny red top and a grandmotherly cardigan. The reactions to this were astonished, amused – but definitely interested.
Lively, who became known in the mid-00s through the series “Gossip Girl” about rich teenagers in Manhattan, but has rarely appeared in films in recent years, usually attracts attention as a guest at the Met Gala or at fashion shows. Was there naivety, intention, subversion or planned “method dressing” behind these looks, i.e. styling that fits the theme of the film? The most apt comment on Lively’s fashion missteps came from Instagram style critic HauteLeMode: “Ugly, but somehow captivating.”
So you did everything right after all?
These words could be used to describe many of the terribly beautiful looks of famous people that dominate the discourse in fashion and pop culture. From the beret cliches and eye-sore color combinations in the Netflix series “Emily in Paris” to the puffy cake dresses in the “Sex and the City” spin-off “And Just Like That” to the majorette uniforms worn by Taylor Swift on her “Eras” tour: Even when the fashion looks bad – or especially when it does – it generates enough conversation that the person or film character in question becomes the center of a style debate and benefits from the attention. Either because the looks are crazy and unrealistic, as if marketers were deliberately setting them up for entertainment, or because the awkward styling makes the wearer seem more human and approachable.
The latter is all the more noticeable today, as fashion is being used strategically more than ever – with the aim that the right look, the perfect staging and the discourse it triggers lead to likes, ticket sales or lucrative advertising contracts with lifestyle and luxury brands. “Successful styling can increase a star’s fan base. When stars like Rihanna, Kim Kardashian, Zendaya, Kylie Jenner or Emma Chamberlain invested in their fashionable image, their careers went through the roof,” observed stylist Kim Russell in an interview with the Australian “Harper’s Bazaar”. It has long been known that some stars have specialists put together even the seemingly sloppy outfits they wear to get their coffee to go or arrive at the airport.
Fashion has also taken on a new importance in the marketing of films and series. Stars often dress to match the film during premieres and press events – like Margot Robbie, who practically continued her role as “Barbie” in interviews and on the red carpet last summer by appearing in pink outfits or in dresses inspired by Barbie dolls. Actress Zendaya, on the other hand, was celebrated earlier this year for the looks she used to promote her film “Challengers” – for the story about a love triangle in the world of tennis, she wore dresses with racket motifs, pleated skirts and lots of white and lawn green.
It looks good, but often also seems impersonal and somehow controlled by others. With Blake Lively, on the other hand, it is clear what she personally likes: cheerful colors, glitter, patterns – and preferably all of them at once. Lively also tried to adapt her wardrobe to the theme of the film during her promotional appearances for “Just Once”, a process that is also known as “method dressing”. Her film character Lily Bloom works as a florist, and so Lively repeatedly wrapped herself in lavish floral ornaments, which she always combined with the thick rings of her favorite jewelry designer Lorraine Schwartz, one of which she wore on each finger. A stylist would probably have strongly advised against this. But Lively even had flowers painted on her fingernails.
While fashion-conscious observers can only wonder about Blake Lively’s loud floral fantasies, many are apparently asking themselves the question about Taylor Swift: Why does a woman who is so rich and successful dress so boringly? The pop star is not wearing the latest Balenciaga look, but rather clothes from mainstream brands like Zara or Madewell that any American teenager could find in a shopping mall in the Midwest. Swift likes shorts, short skirts, statement T-shirts and girlish loafers or Mary Janes with platform heels.
Many so-called Swifties are likely to feel attracted to this accessible clothing style, which raises the question of whether there is a marketing strategy behind so much normality. Even on stage, she lets loose in glittery bodysuits and fringed dresses suitable for figure skating, which look pretty but do not add any new visual level or content complexity to the performance, as Beyoncé’s stage costumes reliably do. Swift’s message, on the other hand, is that mainstream taste is also completely fine.
Cliché-laden costume images
Whether they were dressed too loudly or too banal, celebrities have always made headlines with fashion mistakes. In her light blue bustier dress, Jodie Foster looked like a schoolgirl on her way to the prom at the 1989 Oscars. In 2001, singer Björk appeared at the film awards ceremony in a now legendary dress in the shape of a swan. You could imagine something like that in the very successful series “Emily in Paris”. In it, American marketing consultant Emily, who emigrated to Paris, wears colorful girls’ fashion, such as dresses with hearts, blouses with huge shoulders and very wild color combinations. The fourth season, which has just started, is once again reliably causing debates about which of Emily’s looks is the most terrible. But that too has contributed to the series’ success.
If they attract attention, even bad outfits can have a positive effect. Of course, very few stars want to end up on one of the relevant worst-dressed lists, but even if they do, they have achieved something that has become difficult today: they have been noticed. And that alone can make a person a fashion role model. The character of Carrie Bradshaw from the series “Sex and the City”, which ran between 1998 and 2006, is still remembered today because for some reason she is standing on the street in a ballet tutu in the opening credits. “As in art, originality is what counts in fashion,” said Patricia Field, the series’ costume designer, in the British “Guardian”.
In a time when the looks that celebrities wear in public are often carefully planned by stylists and consultants, it’s better to be a little over the top than boring.
