Photograph: Cindy Ord/Getty Pictures
On the brand new “Gossip Woman,” Savannah Lee Smith performs Monet de Haan, the imply woman terrorizing Constance Billard whereas aiming for a profession in PR at any price — friendships included, because the sequence hit its mid-season finale with Monet MIA after a dressing up contest betrayal. It is a efficiency so convincing you could not be blamed for assuming Smith herself would possibly, say, dump a turmeric latte down your model new sweater. However she’s (fortunately, for the sake of my very own cream-colored Marc Jacobs sweatshirt) exactly the other in particular person once we catch up on the Kate Spade New York occasion on Wednesday morning: charming, bubbly and tremendous pleasant.
“It is my first trend week ever! So I am actually excited,” she says. “It feels insane. As a little bit woman, I grew up watching the Met [Gala] and trend week and all of the exhibits and dreamed of being part of it.”
One different manner Smith differs from the character she performs on TV? Whereas Monet was seemingly born figuring out the distinction between Balmain and Balenciaga, for the younger actor, “Gossip Woman” served as a crash course within the trade. She was at all times all for trend, lowercase-f, but it surely was working with costume designer extraordinaire Eric Daman that received Smith invested within the type of capital-F trend that guidelines the Higher East Facet.
“After seeing the best way that Eric works with individuality, you possibly can inform that each character is so crafted of their clothes, so particular to them. It gave me an thought of the place I wished to go together with trend,” she says. “Each time I’m going to a becoming, he is like, ‘Are you aware this model?’ And I am like, ‘No no no’; I look it up, I write it down in my Notes app, like, ‘I would like this costume.’ It is an academic factor for me.”
Smith is proving herself a quick research, exhibiting as much as the present’s premiere in Louis Vuitton, then jazzing up her easy black Kate Spade New York jumpsuit with an identical set of assertion jewels — a giant cocktail ring and chandelier earrings — and glittering Mary Jane pumps. She likes to experiment with shade and attention-grabbing items. “I even have a little bit of an androgynous facet I am attempting to domesticate proper now,” she says. “Love some fight boots.”
Smith’s key accent, although, was an apple-shaped “I Love NY” bag, since Wednesday’s occasion was all about celebrating Kate Spade’s assortment emblazoned with Milton Glazer’s iconic tourism brand. It is becoming for the Los Angeles native, who moved to New York in 2018 to attend NYU’s Tisch Faculty of the Arts solely to attain a starring position in one in every of tv’s hottest properties only a couple years in.
Smith was already enamored with the town, however “Gossip Woman” deepened her appreciation for her new hometown. “My life modified immediately. It simply made me fall in love with New York extra, as a result of ‘Gossip Woman’ is sort of a love letter to New York,” she says. “The present has proven me components of New York I had by no means seen earlier than.”
Then, with a sly grin, Smith leans in to share one in every of her favourite issues to joke about: “It is humorous, as a result of ‘Gossip Woman’ makes New York look very, very stunning, and it is — typically! There is not any trash on the road in ‘Gossip Woman,’ but it surely’s there in actual life.”
Joking about rubbish: Simply another excuse Smith is a lot extra lovable and relatable than her on-screen persona.
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