DECEMBER 2017 75had done yoga the night before and was just stretching on set and
we said: ‘Yes! Let’s do that!’” the very petite Sarah Ellen is saying
over juice in Sydney’s Paddington during a freak rainy spell of her
Vogue shoot. “The clothes were all ready and we were messing around
with the set and it was ‘Yoga with Sarah Ellen’,” she says after she
slipped into a standing tree pose in Gucci heels. The result, though, is an
impossible version of chic yoga in a luxury harem, perhaps on a rooftop
at sunset in a languid lean that recalls that Talitha Getty photo. Switch
the activewear for the aforementioned brand’s foulard Palazzo pants in
psychedelic paisley and it’s a character she can slip into easily.
“When I’m working at events like fashion week or photo shoots, I like
to be very colourful,” says the 19-year-old actress, model and polymath
whose pursuits seem to stretch further than just the ‘influencer’ label.
Limbering up for a night out in the season’s best prints is part of the
deal for someone who travels the world collaborating with brands like
Tiffany & Co. and Saint Laurent, shooting video and photos for her
website Perks of Her, which she’s just relaunched, and for a fledgling
acting career that has taken her from the cast of Neighbours to LA.
Being well versed in switching characters made her see the act of
putting on clothes differently. “People have a certain style and a certain
aesthetic and they can stick to that. I’m not that person,” she says simply.
“I like a variety of different clothes. I love vintage ... and then at the
same time I love sneakers and I love wearing heels. I love wearing
thigh-high boots.”
With a neat chocolate crop that she dyed from ice blonde earlier this
year, Ellen has buoyancy befitting her youth and an optimism that
catches on. Her skin has that teenage glow; after all, she is one, though
barely. She has the unnerving birth year of 1998, given she works so
much, and will turn 20 next January.
The calibre of names both in beauty and fashion vying to work with
her – she recently returned from London with Tommy Hilfiger – means
being able to explore new ways with well-traversed dress codes is a job
requirement. It’s how she built a social media following of nearly
amillion and how she tackles wallpaper prints for evening. “I like to
take risks with patterns and different materials, especially when it
comes to editorials that I create,” she says.
The alternatives to glitzed eveningwear offered by designers on
runways of late is, as Ellen puts it, the “not so cliche” way to do party
dressing this time around. The varietals for resort filtered in through
anostalgic lens beginning in the vicinity of Ossie Clark and Biba, from
Ellery’s 70s-tinged rust-and-yolk florals, Japanese paper-via-De
Gournay florals at Diane von
Furstenberg and the good-times
vibes of Hawaiian patterns at
Miu Miu and Stella McCartney.
It is decadence and decorative
with more than a pinch of the
past; a look that wouldn’t be out
of place on a Wes Anderson set,
a creative with a particularly
strong pull for Ellen.
“Wes Anderson is a genius!”
she exclaims when we get on to
the subject of film. “Growing up
watching films was definitely a
huge part of my life,” she says,
remembering her stepfather
stopping off at the DVDI
Above: Ellery dress, $1,095, pants, $895, and boots, $1,200. Cartier hoop earrings,
$9,800, earring, $42,200 for a pair, and rings, $3,200 and $5,600. Below: Emma
Mulholland shirt, $160, and pants, $250. Karen Walker hat, $275. Paloma Picasso
for Tiffany & Co. earrings, $745. Double Rainbouu bag, $170. Gucci shoes, $955.“People have a
certain style and
they stick to
that. I’m not that
person. I like
a variety of
different clothes.
I love vintage ...
and then at the
same time I love
sneakers and
→ wearing heels”