Sarah Jessica Parker showed the power of upcycling outfits in the season two premiere of And Just Like That.
In this reboot of classic series Sex And The City, Parker – who plays newspaper columnist-turned-podcaster Carrie Bradshaw – rewears one of her most iconic outfits: an opulent Vivienne Westwood wedding dress.
Bradshaw wore this gown in the first Sex And The City movie, when she was left at the altar by Mr Big (played by Chris Noth).
In the premiere episode of the new season, the characters are getting ready for fashion’s biggest night out: the Met Gala.
Bradshaw enlists up-and-coming designer Smoke to make her outfit – the theme of the night is ‘Veiled Beauty’ – but due to various blunders, the outfit she plans on wearing doesn’t fit.
So, she decides to look in her extensive wardrobe for a backup option – and what could be more fitting for the veil theme than a wedding dress?
Bradshaw says in the episode: “I may have something. I’ve only worn it once. It’s not the best memory.”
She wears the voluminous Vivienne Westwood strapless gown with the original blue feathered headpiece, a veil, and a turquoise cape made by Smoke.
Parker, 58, told People about the “complicated” process of getting the iconic dress back.
“We weren’t entirely certain that we could get the dress back,” she said. “It was in London and unearthing it was complicated — getting it through customs in time and then making sure was this, in fact, the original dress? The colour looked different.”
In the first series of And Just Like That, Bradshaw ended up married to Mr Big, who later died suddenly.
Parker wondered how they could bring the dress into the modern era, and told People: “How would we layer it and give it a new life, and have it feel modern and change the poetry that surrounded that dress from a lot of really painful but important memories that I don’t think Carrie really wanted to let go of, especially given this loss?”
She even said it was “terrifying” to put the dress on 15 years after the first movie – but it still fits.
And Just Like That follows the lives and loves of three characters from the original Sex And The City series: Carrie, Charlotte (played by Kristin Davis) and Miranda (Cynthia Nixon), with new faces also joining the cast.
Sex And The City ran for six series from 1998 to 2004, with two feature films released in 2008 and 2010.
Kim Cattrall – who rounded out the foursome in the original series as Samantha – decided not to join the reboot. However, Variety has reported that she will make a brief cameo in the series two finale, where she will have a phone conversation with Carrie.
Episodes one and two of And Just Like That series two are now available on Sky.
