Rowan Blanchard Opens up to Rodarte’S Kate and Laura Mulleavy on Fashion, Film and Feminism

AN OUTSPOKEN VOICE IN A NEW GENERATION OF ACTIVISTS, MULTIHYPHENATE ROWAN BLANCHARD OPENS UP TO RODARTE’S KATE AND LAURA MULLEAVY ON FASHION, FILM AND FEMINISM PHOTOGRAPHY BY ZOEY GROSSMAN CREATIVE AND FASHION DIRECTION BY ALISON EDMOND EDITED BY MELISSA GOLDSTEIN MICHAEL KORS COLLECTION dress, $9,500. MANOKHI choker, $71. GLYNNETH B necklaces, $395 and $550. CHANEL dress, $11,600, gloves, $1,475, and earrings, $1,425. GIUSEPPE ZANOTTI boots, $1,495. True to her Generation Z roots, Rowan There was something very exciting about short, so you have to take every moment Blanchard isn’t one to stay in the lane you. We didn’t know anything about you, to observe everything you can. It informs assigned to her. She made her name star- but we did wonder: Who is this person? every artistic process—to be a part of life ring in the Disney Channel series Girl It was cool to meet you and see that you and to experience it. In fashion, I do notice Meets World, and followed that with a have such a broad and wonderful curiosity. how fast it’s all moving, and how much it’s turn in Ava DuVernay’s A Wrinkle in Time At what point in your life did you realize changing. What makes you love fashion? (2018), but for the 16-year-old Angeleno, that you had an artistic inclination outside Rowan: Well, I find the idea of having a the label “actor” doesn’t begin to skim the of acting? body to be so weird. Like, it’s weird to be surface. There’s also her recent campaign Rowan: I started acting when I was 5, so born into a skin and just have to figure it for Miu Miu (which, for the record, has it is basically the only thing that I remem- out. And I think that fashion is this way— her “on cloud nine,” she says), yet adding ber. There was always this part of me that especially now in my teenage years, where “model” to her bio is, at best, reductive. couldn’t really see myself just acting— I feel so strange about what it means to be Instead, Blanchard describes herself as just being somebody’s puppet. The more looked at, and, like, wanting to be looked “a person who thinks a lot,” and backs movies I watched and accumulated, and at and [wanting to] manipulate that. But it up: Look no further than her public the more books I read, the more artists I also, it’s fun. And, of course, it’s serious musings on intersectional feminism and learned about, I felt like I had more ammu- and an art form, but it’s fun to try on identifying as queer (she has 5.2 million nition or something. Even on Girl Meets clothes and I get excited for fittings and I followers on Instagram and more than World, once I realized I could have input get excited when I get to go to your studio. half a million on Twitter), her speech in the show rather than just playing Riley, Laura: It is! Fashion is fun. And you at the U.S. National Committee for UN it made me interested in creating more know, the participation of women fashion Women’s annual conference as part of things. designers in fashion history is so pow- #TeamHeForShe, and Still Here (Razor- Kate: Was it set up in your household to erful, and yet, still such a marginalized bill), her art project-styled book, pub- be interested in the arts, or is that some- voice. I was just told that only 14 percent lished earlier this year, which features thing that kind of came from you? of major fashion companies are designed “IT FEELS LIKE EVERYTHING IS HAPPENING SO QUICKLY AND SO IN THE MOMENT THAT IF I STOP TO WRITE ABOUT IT, I’LL MISS IT.” multimedia contributions from the likes Rowan: My parents definitely influ- by, or headed by, women. But I feel like of Gia Coppola and Jenny Zhang on the enced me. It was encouraged: I saw The fashion is a world that is super accepting subject of teenagehood and growing up. Rocky Horror Picture Show too early, and still has so far to go...I mean, the great- Naturally her friendships manifest in and I was allowed to view art as art, and est changes in fashion have happened a creative crew, including Coppola, Yara spend time in museums and sort of wan- because of women: Vivienne Westwood Shahidi, and Rodarte’s Kate and Laura der. When I started to have access to the with punk, or Madeline Vionnet removing Mulleavy, who first met Blanchard at a internet on my own, I was able to fall into the corset, or, you know, Coco Chanel say- dinner party they hosted to celebrate their these internet spirals of artists...I think ing, ‘Let’s wear flats.’ I think that’s what’s 2016 collaboration with & Other Stories, that’s a lot of why it seems like my gener- so cool about it. What do you want to and later invited her to co-star in their Fall ation is impressively well-informed in art achieve with your voice? 2018 lookbook alongside Kirsten Dunst, and movies and stuff, because so much of Rowan: I still toy a lot with whatever Grimes and Miranda July. “Rowan has an online culture is based in aesthetic. it means to call myself an activist or an individual soul,” notes Laura, “and you Kate: That reminds me: You wrote a artist or someone who just likes words, want to see that within fashion, because book. Are you going to write another one? and I guess at the end of the day, I’m just fashion is about individuality.” Rowan: The book came out in February, a person who thinks a lot, and sometimes The designers-cum-filmmakers, who and I still feel like so much has happened it feels like I can compile those thoughts will be the subjects of the first fashion to me personally since then. So much of enough to share them with others. For exhibition organized by the National your teenhood is about dreaming about me, the thing I really want to achieve by Museum of Women in the Arts in Wash- what it’s going to be like...and I’m finally using my voice is to have more of a con- ington, D.C., this November, connected hitting the point where I feel like I’m living versation. For now, I want to listen more with Blanchard on the heels of her Miu the movie [moments] and having all these and not speak as much, and maybe speak Miu campaign to discuss artistic ammuni- glimpses—like, oh, that’s like Heathers! At when I feel like what I have to say hasn’t tion, the power of a public platform, and some point, when I’m able to get a bit of been said, or it’s important for me to say it. the unadulterated fun of fashion. distance from it, I will sit and write. But There’s this sort of construed thing online Laura: When Kate and I and Kirsten right now, it feels like everything is hap- that anyone who has a platform has to [Dunst] were shooting the movie we made pening so quickly and so in the moment speak on everything. together [Woodshock], we ended up watch- that if I stop to write about it, I’ll miss it. Laura: For me, social media is a very ing Girl Meets World on our Saturdays off. Laura: People always say that life’s different language Continued on p.194 SEPTEMBER 2018 C 151 MIU MIU dress, $3,195, and shoes, $990. HOUSE OF EMMANUELE necklace, $2,405, and ring, $195. WOLFORD socks, $33. Opposite: PRADA dress, $3,120. GLYNNETH B earrings, $165. SAINT LAURENT BY ANTHONY VACCARELLO dress, price upon request. THE OFFICE OF ANGELA SCOTT boots, CREDITS $495. Opposite: OSCAR DE LA RENTA dress, $4,290, and coat, $2,690. CHARLOTTE OLYMPIA pumps, $1,025. BOTTEGA VENETA dress, $3,600. BHLDN earrings, $450. Opposite: MONCLER 4 SIMONE ROCHA dress, $4,985. OSCAR DE LA RENTA earrings, $510. FALKE socks, $28. T.U.K. FOOTWEAR creepers, $105. Makeup: TOM FORD Eye Quad in Cocoa Mirage, $88, Illuminating Highlight Pen, $54, and Lip Color in Bruised Plum, $55. GLOSSIER Generation G lipstick in Jam, $18, and Lip Gloss, $14. Hair by LAURIE HEAPS using Redken. Makeup by AMY STROZZI at TMG‑LA using Tom Ford. Nails by CHRISTINA AVILES at Opus Beauty using Essentiel by Adele. Shot at THE PARAMOUR ESTATE, theparamour.com. SEE SHOPPING GUIDE FOR DETAILS, P.195. P.195. DETAILS, SEE SHOPPING GUIDE FOR BEAUTY AND THE ANGST Finally, another establishment opening pertains to a male gaze—I really couldn’t CONTINUED FROM P.134 in the next year promises to leave its mark be happier to have my first official cam- on Downtown Los Angeles. Next spring, paign be representing her brand and her… Classical dance appealed to Prager right the long-awaited Soho Warehouse will Kate: I’ve seen you be involved in fash- away; she counts The Red Shoes as one open near the Arts District, in the former ion for a while now. There’s some people of her favorite films. “From far away, bal- music rehearsal studios at 1000 S. Santa who fit in naturally with it, and don’t let let looks like the most beautiful fantasy Fe Ave.

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