Audrey Hepburn: Timeless Style

Audrey Hepburn is an icon. What I mean by icon is that people from all ages see a photograph of her and recognise who she is. Fashion and movie fans alike are able to relate to her elegant beauty and talented acting skills. Her work in Africa in her later years is met with respect and acknowledgment of a lady who defined the striking 1950's and 60's of Hollywood glamour and has set trends which are copied and reworked again and again. She is iconic.

Her role as Holly Golightly is one of the most famous in cinematic history. That little black dress with the necklace around her neck, hair scraped up into an elegant bun with a cigarette resting lightly in her hand is an image that many of us have seen in timeless fashion shoots and editorials. Since her breakout role in the 1952 classic, 'Roman Holiday' with Cary Grant, she went on to win an Oscar, star in movies opposite Fred Astaire, Humphrey Bogart and Sean Connery and reinvent fashion with great success. Hubert de Givenchy claimed her as his own, dressing her for all official engagements with his elegant and classy dresses which had the whole world talking in awe about the Hollywood starlet. She was the hot toast of the movies!

Born in Europe, Hepburn never craved the glamour of America or in fact Hollywood. She wanted to become a ballet dancer, but this dream abruptly ended after picking up an injury. Her athletic and tall body was at first considered not the right fit for movies, with curvaceous  actresses Marilyn Monroe and Sophia Loren leading the way in the sexy 50's look. But Hepburn represented a different type of woman, the girl next door type who was incredibly skinny but used her body in such a fashionable way that a new breed of icon was born. Her classic roll neck jumpers, Capri pants, cat eye sunglasses and classic eye liner flick had women all over the world copying her look, with Hepburn featuring on the US cover of Vogue twice.

I love Audrey Hepburn because she was different in a world full of artificial beauty. She had her hard times (she miscarried her first child and fought her battle with cancer in the 90’s) but was always seen as the epitome of elegance and class. From 'Sabrina,' 'Funny Face' and 'My Fair Lady,' to 'Nuns Story' and 'Charade' - her movies will go down in history and are defiantly worth watching if you haven’t already seen them! The famous quote by Coco Chanel sums up Audrey perfectly: 'Fashion fades, only style remains the same...'