COSMOPOLITAN · 35CELEBRITYanyone under 35 looking for anything
other than a second-interview work
suit. Because what they are buying into
with Palermo is her. They’re buying
the upscale, glossy clothes horse with
the impeccable eye for high-low style.
They’re buying a piece of the woman
we all secretly want to dress like... if
only we didn’t like elasticated jogging
pants so much. They are spending
their hard-earned pennies on a
consumer-flogging fashion machine.
Except, in the flesh, she’s not as
glossy or as gilded as you would think.
She lives in Brooklyn for a start, in a
waterfront apartment with her model
husband, Johannes Huebl, and Maltese
dog, Mr Butler, not far from where
we meet. It’s a smart, but un-glitzy,
neighbourhood, and a relatively long
way south for an uptown specimen
like Palermo, once known as the ‘It’
girl of Manhattan.
In person, she is pared-
back, too – natural make-up,
‘zhooshy’ hair, an oversized
military green hoodie that
reaches her fingertips, and
clumpy, black mannish
boots (they’re Dior as it
turns out). The effect,
I suppose, is to disguise just
how devastatingly good-
looking she is IRL – a kind
of Audrey Hepburn by way
of a ’90s Cindy Crawford.
“So, do you dress yourself ?” I ask.
She falls back in her seat, laughing.
“Of course! That’s the whole point of
my brand!” (And, for the record, her
brand is an effortless mix of high-end
designer with low-cost high street.)
I ask her where all of her stuff is then.
She must, after all, get given so many
clothes. She can’t possibly keep them
all in her apartment, can she? “I can’t
tell you that,” she demures. “What,
really?” I persist. “For now it’s at home.
It’s very organised.” There’s a pause.
“I have my own system...”
She is as frustratingly coy about the
system as she is about how many items
of clothes she gets given or even i“Of course
I dress myself.
That’s the point
of my brand”FIRST SPREAD: SHIRT, AROUND £55, BANANA REPUBLIC. BRIEFS, £75, FIFI CHACHNIL. MULTICOLOURED SHOES, £643, PAULA CADEMARTORI. VEL
VET SHOES, £475; CRYSTAL SANDALS (JUST SEEN), £950, BOTH GIUSEPPE ZANOTTI.
CREAM AND SILVER SANDALS, £775, CHRISTIAN LOUBOUTIN. SLIPPERS, £35, THE FINE COTTON COMPANY. EARRINGS, AROUND £214, SHOUROUK. £425, ALESSANDRA RICH AT NET-A-PORTER.COM. £140, ASHLEY WILLIAMS. SECONDSPREAD: BLUE TULLE LONG DRESS WITH ALL-OVER GRADIENT BLUE SEQUINS EMBROIDERY, DIOR. THIS PAGE: SCARF (WORN AS TURBAN), AROUND £39, BANANA REPUBLIC. ROBE £65, THE FINE COTTON COMPANY