Fashion girls everywhere were in hysterics on social media earlier this week when Céline revealed its newest campaign star: writer Joan Didion, who looks beyond fab in a pair of dark sunglasses in the Juergen Teller-shot campaign photo. This combination of fashion and literature could seem surprising at first—until you really think about it. Who better to act as the face of a brand with seemingly endless witty cool-girl appeal than an intellectual literary and style icon like Didion? We just wish we had thought of it before!
This is definitely one we didn’t see coming, but the campaign makes total sense. After all, it was Didion’s thoughtful narratives that shaped the literary culture of the 1970’s, a decade that Phoebe Philo, the creative director of Céline, seems to love referencing in her collections. Didion is also known to be a master of the minimalist aesthetic that is so prevalent in the Céline brand, as is evident by her well-known packing list from her essay collection, The White Album that lists precisely, “2 skirts, 2 jerseys or leotards, 1 pullover sweater.” Oh, and did we mention the uncanny resemblance of the famous 1968 portrait of Didion sitting in her corvette and Celine’s resort campaign photo featuring Daria Werbowy?
Let’s also not forget that Didion won a Vogue essay contest during her senior year of college, which led to a two-year stint writing for the magazine after college—the fashion world has definitely shown her some love in the past.
Didion’s Céline campaign is a major moment for the fashion industry for another reason—it’s not every day that you see an 80-year-old woman starring in a major fashion advertising campaign. The fashion industry has long been criticized for failing to feature anyone older than her mid-twenties in advertising or on the runway, and we’re thinking this might be the perfect push the industry needs to start featuring a wider range of women. With how great Didion looks here, how could they not?
We’re still having a hard time getting over just how cool Joan Didion looks in those Céline sunglasses. What are your thoughts on this fashion-meets-literature moment, collegiettes?
