Welcome to Shopping With Vogue, a series where people with top-tier personal style bring us along as they look to add to their impressive wardrobes.
Maisie Williams won’t let a snowstorm-turned-torrential downpour stop her from shopping. The actor brought Vogue along with her to go treasure hunting at James Veloria, the colorful vintage shop overflowing with gems, tucked inside a Chinatown mall.
Williams, who is in New York City promoting her show The New Look (a biographical series based on Christian Dior in which she plays the designer’s sister, Catherine) braved the adverse weather conditions in search of something for a special occasion—her 27th birthday. While it isn’t until April, she already has it has planned to a T: a 1970s disco extravaganza complete with games like freeze dance and lucky dip. “I’ve been hunting high and low for an archive Bob Mackie dress,” she says. “I want to dress as Cher. Who doesn’t want to dress as Cher?”
While a Bob Mackie may not be in the cards today, Williams takes a spin around James Veloria, where a ’90s Vivienne Westwood corset, prim Miu Miu coat dress from fall 2000, and funky striped Chanel shirt with exaggerated sleeves all catch her eye.
The star’s love of fashion was brewing well before the world of designer clothing opened up to her. “I was one of those kids who wouldn’t wear a coat because it would ruin my outfit,” she says. Case in point: “I climbed a mountain in the UK without a coat on ’cause there was, like, a boy on the holiday with us that I had a crush on,” she recalls. “My mum was like, You have to wear a coat, and I was like, I will never wear a coat, especially on this day—you’re not going to ruin my life for me.” When she got to the top of the mountain and was faced with “the worst weather in the world,” she reached a powerful conclusion. “I’d do it again,” she says, laughing. Spoken like a true fashionphile!
Although she may not ever abandon her formative fashion philosophy, Williams feels that she’s reached a turning point in her style evolution. (Given her recent looks, from the Margiela number she wore to Vogue World: London, to the archival toile skirt set from Vivienne Westwood that she wears to go shopping, we have to agree.) “I think I try and dress in other people’s colors a lot. I’ve now gotten into what colors suit me,” she says. She pulls a pair of turquoise silk trousers. “These are not my style, but this is a color that really works on me. It’s nice to start filtering out a huge rack like this by the things you know will look good on you.” But, she acknowledges, rules are meant to be broken. “And I love to do that.”