Twenty-seven years after her death, the former Calvin Klein “VIP whisperer” is once again in the fashion spotlight, with Love Story viewers clamoring to emulate her signature look. As it turns out, looking effortless takes a lot of work.
Thanks to Love Story , the new series chronicling the relationship between the Kennedy scion and Besette, which ended with the tragic incident at Martha's Vineyard, the world is obsessed with her once again, luring in not only diehard romantics but fashionistas who see the female lead as their new muse as well.
Bessette lived before the dawn of social media: In 1994, when her image began to circulate in glossy magazines and tabloids, she was praised for her style, but it was not until after her passing and the arrival of the internet, that she became a global style icon. Author Sunita Kimar Nair even published CBK: Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, A Life in Fashion, considered a style bible for admirers of the late Bessette's wardrobe of simple and refined garments. Until now, however, Bessette had never come to life on screen . Played on the show by Sarah Pidgeon, audiences on TikTok have gone into a frenzy with appreciations and tutorials showing how to style Besette staples like a white shirt, pencil skirt, and headband. Easy, right? Or…not. The secret to timeless style A black wool sweater, beige coat, and jeans are staples for those looking to copy Carolyn Bessette, but the items alone aren't enough to come close to the same look. Her sense of personal style and taste are what helped define an aesthetic that persisted through a decade, much longer than a transient trend. Designers such as Prada, Helmut Lang, Calvin Klein, Jil Sander, and Donna Karan all embraced the “less is more” ethos at the time, defining what we now call “quiet luxury” with looks that worked by subtraction, succeeding in the arduous feat of being stark but simultaneously glamorous and sexy. Today, brands like The Row use clean lines that are influenced by nineties minimalism. Nineties minimalism “Just as the Bauhaus dedicated itself to the relentless pursuit of pure form, today’s minimalists—from Jil Sander to Calvin Klein—aim for the same goal. Fashion embraces the new uniform,” Vogue wrote in the introduction of a May 1996 editorial spread shot by Steven Meisel and featuring model Stella Tennant. Free of the trappings and exaggerations of the 1980s, fashion had turned to celebrating clothes in their simplest, purest form, with invisible seams and clean lines, devoid of embellishments and in a strictly neutral, pattern-free palette. It was not just another trend but a real cultural shift, partly a reaction to the economic turmoil of the time. Calvin Klein was a vanguard of this new wave of style, boasting perfect-cut monochrome suits, trapeze shift dresses, and impeccable blazers, making the house synonymous with minimalism. His collections were poised between seemingly impossible opposites, essential and super sexy at the same time . Jil Sander also made minimalism a true art form, proving that removing elements from an outfit was an act as powerful as it was revolutionary: her approach to fashion was almost philosophical, a peculiarity she had in common with Helmut Lang, who proposed severe silhouettes, with an almost surgical cut, primarily in black and white, with a few rare beige touches. We also cannot fail to mention Donna Karan, who back in 1985 launched Seven Easy Pieces, a mini-collection consisting of seven basic garments designed to solve the dilemma that assails us every day: “What shall I wear today?” Her color of choice, needless to say, was black, because it nullified everything else, highlighting the person. In 1994, models opened the house's Spring-Summer 1995 fashion show wearing a simple slip skirt complemented by a blazer and bra, all in black. Prada, too, with its intellectual and measured approach, helped define the fashion of the period, mixing rigorous lines with unexpected and luxurious materials. As you may have noticed, minimalism was traversed by a very specific leitmotif, which was common to all the designers. Their collections were designed to be functional and worn in real life, adapting to the needs of a woman who has a dynamic life, mixing work and play, just like Carolyn Bessette. Bessette also loved Japanese fashion master Yohji Yamamoto. According to Rosemarie Terenzio, personal assistant to John Kennedy Jr. in the days of George , Barneys, one of New York's most exclusive department stores, alerted Bessette the moment new clothes by the Japanese designer arrived in the boutique. At a 1999 gala at the Whitney Museum, she sported one of her most copied ensembles, a white shirt by Yamamoto Homme tucked into a black skirt decorated with ruffles, part of the women's collection. The designer himself, on the other hand, liked to mix masculine and feminine so much that on the runway of the Spring-Summer 1999 show, he had pairs of models walk together. Bessette was a true fashion connoisseur who knew what she liked and wore the same clothes over and over again. She had clear ideas, and was gifted with the rare ability to anticipate trends. The slip dress designed by Narciso Rodriguez worn at her wedding, for example, may seem an almost trivial choice now, but back in the day it was revolutionary, and ended up changing bridal fashion forever. Style in the time of social TikTok and Instagram have accustomed us to doing everything at breakneck speed, experimenting with disposable trends that quickly run out of steam. An approach to dressing like Bessette's, reasoned down to the smallest details from the silhouette to the fabrics, is intended to transcend time. The goal should be to fill the closet with garments that we really like, fit well, and will feel like wearing for a long time. In the meantime, there's nothing wrong with “borrowing” the looks of others—as long as we use it as a means of ultimately finding our own personal style. Originally published in Vanity Fair Italia.
Fashion Calvin Klein Love Story Carolyn Bessette Kennedy Carolyn Bessette John F. Kennedy Jr. Digital_Syndication
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