Great swathes of well-established fashion houses will have spent the past couple of weeks scrambling for their designs to be photographed on Florence Pugh and Zendaya – who are currently undertaking an international promo tour for Dune: Part Two, a film about a boy that rides a massive sand worm in space. But both actors – and their respective stylists (sorry, creative directors) – are beginning to approach all these junkets and red carpets as opportunities to showcase the next generation of London’s design talent.
As two of the most famous women in the world, Florence and Zendaya have their pick of esteemed ateliers: gliding between Bottega Veneta and Schiaparelli and Vivienne Westwood and Stella McCartney with almost zero friction. And while those looks have all been well-received – not to mention earning tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of pounds in earned media value for those brands – it is perhaps a bigger coup to be seen in a fashion insider’s label.
It’s why archive fashion has become such a thing over recent years and it might also explain Pugh and Zendaya’s recent patronage of Torishéju, Standing Ground and Paolo Carzana. It takes a little more knowledge – and a hard-won fashion capital – to be able to wear something that others cannot easily recognise. I’d wager that Law Roach (Zendaya’s image architect) began to root out a couple of these names while acting as red carpet host at the 2023 Fashion Awards. He had after all, already styled the actor in Chet Lo, Conner Ives, Di Petsa, Nensi Dojaka and Aaron Esh for a Smart Water campaign. It is only a matter of time, perhaps, until he makes an appearance at Fantastic Toiles.
