Teyana Taylor: Best Dressed (Duana)

Let’s get something straight right off the top – Teyana Taylor has had an incredible style run in the One Battle After Another awards season, but she’s not yet a staple on the carpet year after year.

This is a good thing. Because let us be honest, both the face card and the body are RIDICULOUS, it’s possible to believe there’s nothing they can’t do, and we are still struggling with Zendaya’s lifetime achievement around these parts. We don’t need to be retiring Teyana Taylor from style contention before her time.

But truly, she does not seem to miss:

My initial thought about this feathery Chanel concoction was that it was almost… elevated Cruella De’Ville, and I say that with the deepest admiration. The reason this works so well is the contrast – not just the black and white, or the immaculately fitted bodice with the lush skirt, though those are both exemplary.

But it’s her energy in it that sends this over the top:

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She’s bouncing and bounding. It’s delicate and it’s also almost electrically charged. The incredible fit of this dress means that her every kinetic energy, intention or emotion is communicated non-verbally through the micro-moves of this garment.

Which is saying something, because her kinetic energy was already RIGHT out there all night. 

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That’s an energetic person one hundred percent of the time, and yeah, by all means let’s do an energetic dress that leans into that! I read more than a few online reactions that were cynical about her jumping up for Amy Madigan’s win (and her own loss) and – look, lots of things can be true. Let’s assume she’s human, and was indeed somewhat disappointed. Maybe even trying to hide those feelings? Sure, I get it, and even if your heart was incredibly pure, sometimes you don’t realize what you’re feeling until you feel it.

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Still, the jump up doesn’t ring false to me because – some people force a smile that doesn’t quite reach their eyes. Some people give a vaguely imperceptible nod to imply a positive feeling about something. But this is Teyana Taylor, who choreographed for Beyoncé when she was 15 years old. Teyana Taylor, who was utterly believable in character handling a massive sub machine gun while 8 ½ months pregnant. Teyana Taylor, who…

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This is a physical woman! She nearly took Paul Thomas Anderson’s neck off, and he liked it!

I, for example, am not a physically kinetic person. (Physically chaotic, yes.) I look best in clothes that have a lot of structure and definition – that make it seem like my awkward limbs are going in random directions on purpose, or have some business where they’re going. I would not be able to drive a dress like this, where every little adjustment is very obvious. 

But her impeccable control is what makes this dress a slam dunk for her – a visual representation of all that enormous joy and energy and enthusiasm that comes out at the smallest delight.

I can’t wait to see how she reinvents it all next time… because you know she’s going to make a point of taking it over the top.

PS – Her Vanity Fair dress is beautiful, and was also seen as the star of a late night photo shoot on the roof of the Roosevelt Hotel yesterday…

…but it was never going to be anything but a faint echo of the black-and-white which all but fused with her soul.