Hailey Bieber on Her Connection to Princess Diana’s Fearless Fashion

Hailey Bieber isn’t alone in her fascination with Princess Diana’s sporty-preppy style, but the way she pulls it off has become iconic in itself.

In an interview for Harper’s BAZAAR‘s September cover story, the supermodel discusses how she sources inspiration from the late royal, not only from her style, but also the way she carried herself in the world.

“I was really inspired by the fact that she was the most-looked-at woman in the world at that time, of all time, and she did what she wanted with her style,” Bieber says of Lady Di. “She really expressed herself through her style despite being in the position she was in.”

It’s a position Bieber—as one of the world’s most famous models and young street style icons, the niece of Hollywood legend Alec Baldwin, the founder of skincare label Rhode, and the wife of pop star Justin Bieber—can relate to.

She admits to BAZAAR that though getting dressed is one of her favorite things to do, it sometimes makes her feel anxious because she thinks about how people will react to it. “I get photographed so much that I feel like sometimes I put pressure on myself,” she says, adding that it’s also part of her own perfectionism. “Even if I’m just throwing on jeans and a T-shirt, I want it to be a dope pair of jeans and a great T-shirt!”

Bieber can just as easily look fabulous in a colorful bucket hat and parachute pants as she can in an oversized men’s button-up or ethereal red-carpet gown. And though her looks are always hyper-contemporary, she regularly goes back to old-school classics, and her approach is meticulous (she plans her outfits days or weeks in advance), just like Princess Diana’s.

In 2019, Bieber starred in a photo shoot for Vogue Paris, in which she paid tribute to the princess by dressing up in her most famous off-duty looks: oversized blazers with baseball caps, sweatshirts with biker shorts, chunky sneakers with crew socks, and all that effortless elegance.

“All credit and inspo to the amazingly beautiful and iconically stylish Princess Diana who I’ve looked to for style inspiration for as long as I can remember. Thank you for leaving behind such an iconic fashion and style legacy,” Bieber captioned photos from the shoot on Instagram.

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Though it’s easy to constantly make comparisons to Lady Di or offer references to eras past when describing Bieber’s ensembles today, it’s impossible not to acknowledge that she has become a fashion symbol in her own right.

“She’s one of the most stylish women I know,” stylist Karla Welch, who has worked with Bieber for red-carpet appearances, as well as with her husband, tells BAZAAR. “I recently went to an event, and everyone looked like her. That’s how powerful and influential she is.”

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