Zendaya continues to be the gift that keeps on giving. But before we get into her latest look, let's rewind a little.
Though I am sure people like Zelda Fitzgerald and Josephine Baker led glamorous lifestyles in the ’20s, the term “Roaring Twenties” has become one of the most unbecoming of the English language. Not least because culture writers thought we'd all exit lockdown and be thrust into a debauched '20s of our own, but mainly because of the phenomenon of prohibition bars, where “in-the-know party-goers” wore feathered headbands and danced the night away.
I'd suggest that Zendaya's most recent dress – a spring/summer 2011 Roberto Cavalli number, which Law Roach pulled from the year 2010 – is the closest thing culture will have to recreating a true '20s fantasia. That is because the gown had been constructed with a jungle of fringing, which had, in turn, been suspended from a décolletage neckline. Zendaya wore that reptilian-printed design to the 2024 Green Carpet Fashion Awards last night. (Roach has never met a theme he didn’t immediately hitch himself to.)
Zendaya was joined on the “red” carpet by the Ugandan climate activist Vanessa Nakate, who authored a 2021 memoir-slash-manifesto titled A Bigger Picture: My Fight To Bring A New African Voice To The Climate Crisis. It’s a big event – and was attended by the likes of Annie Lennox, Donatella Versace, Amber Valletta, Quannah Chasinghorse, and Michaela Rodriguez – aimed at encouraging sustainable solutions to the climate crisis. But Nakate’s approach has always been a little more grassroots: “All you need is a marker pen and a placard,” she once told Vogue. “There is still so much work to be done in platforming, listening, and amplifying the voices of activists on the frontlines.”
This post first appeared in British Vogue.
