Blake Lively exclusive interview – ‘I do my own styling’

What’s your top red-carpet trend for Spring 2013?

I was looking at the fashion shows from couture week in Paris and I noticed that a lot of the outfits looked like they were influenced by that Tom Ford number that Gwyneth Paltrow wore last year to the Oscars with those shoulders, and an almost cape-like overlay. So there were a lot of things like that which I found interesting because there was a through-line in a lot of the different runway shows. You know that these designers aren’t talking with each other because they don’t want to make the same thing, but it was interesting to see the trend. There were a lot of crew necks, which I liked, there were some very fitted bodices, with a double neckline using a boatneck in one pattern and a crewneck in a different one. It’s weird to talk about — I think you have to see it!

How far in advance of a big red-carpet event do you decide your outfit?

I decide probably, five days to a week before. A lot of people have stylists, and beautiful dresses waiting for them and just before they go on the red carpet, they choose their two favorites. But for me, because I do my own styling, I decide probably a week before so that I can gather the jewelry and the shoes and figure out what I want for the hair and makeup.

Have you ever switched an outfit for a big event at the very last minute?

Sometimes I do because you don’t try it on with the right undergarments and I can see my bra strap or whatever. At the last event I went to I had my outfit on and I was walking out the door and it just did not look right with the undergarments I had on so I had to change.

In your opinion who’s the best dressed female star on the red carpet at the moment?

There are a few people that I always really watch. I think Diane Kruger always looks perfect and there’s such a range in her style which I love. I mean, look at her outfits that she wore to Cannes last year. Every day was vastly different from the other and just perfect. So I think Diane Kruger would probably have my vote.

And who’s the best dressed guy?

I love Eddie Redmayne. He’s a friend and I just think that he dresses so well.

Imagine you turn up at an event and another actress who you really respect is wearing the same outfit as you — what do you do?

That’s normally avoided because you’re normally borrowing an outfit from a designer and if it’s just off the runway then there isn’t a second of that look, the times it gets tricky is if you’re wearing something that has already come into stores, which won’t happen with couture, but will if it’s ready-to-wear. I’ve seen it happen before… Designers always assure you that an outfit’s never been worn, and then if somebody actually went to the store and bought it they have no record of that.

I think that it would be kind of funny and kind of fun to see one outfit and the different ways you could style it. It’s always interesting for me to think, ‘okay here’s a dress, and if I wore really straight modern hair slicked back in a ponytail with a smokey eye, this shape would look very different than if I did a Veronica Lake hairdo with red lips, and heavy mascara but subtle eye-makeup’. So I think it would be neat to see how two people interpreted the same thing.

So it’s all about the personal touches?

Yes I think so. It’s not ideal to be wearing the same outfit as someone else, but I think that happens more at prom than on the red carpet.

On “Gossip Girl,” you introduced lots of young people to fashion and influenced their style. When you were growing up, who were your fashion icons?

I grew up only ever watching old movies. My family never really had the TV on, it was always black and white movies, so the people that I always looked to were Katherine Hepburn, Audrey Hepburn, Jean Seberg, who were all very different people. Grace Kelly’s got that very elegant very, very feminine look, and Katherine Hepburn had a very empowered, masculine look while Jean Seberg was a lot more French-looking — even though she was actually American — with her little striped shirts and pixie haircut. I loved the idea of all those women wrapped into one, and I think that the modern woman very much is that.

In a hypothetical housefire you can only save one item from your entire wardrobe. What would it be?

I have to pick one thing? I’d rather stay in the fire!

So there’s not once piece you could pick if you really had to?

I think my Lorraine Schwartz pieces are really special to me. She taught me something that Elizabeth Taylor actually taught to her. She said to only buy a piece of jewelry when it means something, when you’ve succeeded at something that you were hoping for because then it tells a story. You will always go to the piece that has significance over the one you’ve just bought. All of the pieces that I buy from her really mean something, and she’s also one of my best friends so it holds that extra value.

JT