Anne Hathaway Embarks on Her Ice Queen Transformation: A New Era Unfolds

Anne Hathaway is as famous for her earnest relatability as she is for her Oscar-winning performance in Les Misérables and her endlessly quotable turn in The Devil Wears Prada, but—from a fashion perspective, at least—she’s now firmly in her ice-queen era. While on the press circuit for William Oldroyd’s adaptation of Ottessa Moshfegh’s Eileen, the 41-year-old (and her superstylist, Erin Walsh) have leaned into an aesthetic reminiscent of The Lion, The Witch & The Wardrobe’s White Witch (in the best possible way).

Exhibit A: the head-to-toe Des Phemmes look she wore on her way into the Kelly & Mark studio back in November, its white eco-leather embellished with Swarovski crystals. Upping the outfit’s frosty feel: Bulgari jewellery and silver Jimmy Choo sandals (the cold never bothered her anyway).

And for an appearance later that same day? Anne shrugged Anna Quan’s Athena blazer over the Australian label’s Paris dress and slipped on a pair of pristine Christian Louboutin heels. Even her Fashion Awards look—a 37-year-old treasure from the Valentino archives—came in a cream colorway that only accentuated the whiteness of her diamond necklace.

Anne Hathaway’s latest winter white coup: another Des Femmes look on December 8, this time in the form of a crystal-studded bustier and skirt, a matching coat shrugged over the top as she entered and exited the Jimmy Fallon studio. It’s fitting, really; if Hathaway has never succumbed to the allure of character dressing, her Elsa-esque looks do chime with the atmosphere of Eileen, set during a frigid Massachusetts winter in the run-up to Christmas Day, 1964.

The blossoming friendship between the title character (Eileen McKenzie), a desperately lonely, sexually repressed secretary at a boys’ prison, and the reformatory’s new psychiatrist Rebecca (Hathaway), a Harvard graduate given to chainsmoking, downing endless martinis, and…taking the law into her own hands.