<\/p>\n
Grainy paparazzi shots on social media show her hailing a cab in a black slip dress. Walking the streets of New York in an oversize coat. Wearing that signature red lipstick. <\/p>\n
Nearly three decades after her death at age 33, Carolyn Bessette Kennedy is back in the spotlight as one of fashion\u2019s<\/a> most powerful style influencers. The new TV series \u201cLove Story\u201d<\/a> chronicles her relationship with John F. Kennedy Jr., and many fans are watching for the clothes.<\/p>\n In an era dominated by conspicuous branding and obvious cosmetic enhancements, Bessette Kennedy\u2019s enduring appeal lies in what she did not do.<\/p>\n She had no platform, no brand partnerships, no social media presence. <\/p>\n \u201cShe looks so different from the people we see now on Instagram,\u201d said Ashley Traher, a 45-year-old attorney in Phoenix who grew up admiring Bessette Kennedy from afar. \u201cI think we\u2019ll be able to date today\u2019s influencers immediately because of their makeup, clothes, even plastic surgery. But Carolyn had an effortlessness that always looks modern and cool.\u201d<\/p>\n Traher, who first encountered Bessette Kennedy as a teenager flipping through People magazine in rural Lamar, Colorado, dreamed of copying her understated elegance.<\/p>\n \u201cMiddle-aged me is still trying to emulate her,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n A quiet influencer<\/p>\n Bessette Kennedy rarely gave interviews, communicating with the outside world mostly through her clothes, says Sunita Kumar Nair, who wrote \u201cCBK: Carolyn Bessette Kennedy: A Life in Fashion,” and consulted on the show.<\/p>\n \u201cI really got a sense that she was extremely private, and it shows because there\u2019s barely any footage of her speaking,\u201d Nair said.<\/p>\n Yet Bessette Kennedy’s influence has proven durable<\/a>. On TikTok and Instagram, accounts such as @allforcarolyn and @carolynbessettepage are devoted to chronicling her wardrobe. Three of her coats and a little black dress are being auctioned off this month at The Fashion Auctioneer.<\/p>\n Bessette Kennedy, a former Calvin Klein publicist, married Kennedy in 1996. Although her mother-in-law, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis<\/a>, was also famous for her style, \u201cshe didn\u2019t copy Jackie. She had her own voice,\u201d Nair said.<\/p>\n “And it wasn\u2019t something that she just deliberately did when she married John. And this is what I loved about Carolyn. She\u2019d actually dressed like this almost throughout her life,\u201d she said. The couple died in a plane crash in 1999.<\/p>\n Signature pieces<\/p>\n You can still buy Bessette Kennedy’s exact Charles J. Wahba tortoise headband from C.O. Bigelow, a Greenwich Village apothecary where she shopped.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s the original one. That\u2019s the one,\u201d said Alec Ginsberg, 34, whose family has owned the store for four generations.<\/p>\n “We still have one of the beauty associates who remembers her. She was super-sweet. My father remembers her as well,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Ginsberg has seen more customers coming in over the past couple of years \u2014 and especially since \u201cLove Story\u201d began airing \u2014 because of interest in Bessette Kennedy. <\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not just the headband, it\u2019s that people want to shop where she shopped,\u201d he said. “Girls will come in and ask if anyone knew her. They try to find out little bits of information.\u201d<\/p>\n Recreating CBK’s style for TV<\/p>\n \u201cLove Story,\u201d part of Ryan Murphy\u2019s<\/a> expanding slate of cultural retrospectives, sparked debate after fans who saw early test images of the actors in costume<\/a> felt the clothing failed to capture Bessette Kennedy\u2019s precise restraint.<\/p>\n Some of the criticism, Nair said, caught the wardrobe team off guard, and led them to pay more attention to every tailoring detail.<\/p>\n \u201cI think that is actually the irony of Carolyn\u2019s clothes, that it does look simple, but it\u2019s actually really not,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n The first few episodes mostly take place during the period before Bessette Kennedy was famous, and her wardrobe is generally approachable \u2014 a simple black dress, or jeans and a basic top.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m very interested to see if the character\u2019s clothing choices will change as she becomes more ingrained with the Kennedys,\u201d Traher said. \u201cSo far she\u2019s still cool and very ’90s Calvin Klein with the slip dresses, but maybe less polished than she ended up being.\u201d<\/p>\n There’s an \u201cundercover quality\u201d to Bessette Kennedy’s influence, said Rebecca Resnick Gick, a former editor at Vogue and Teen Vogue and a personal shopper. She describes the look as \u201ceducated tailoring.” <\/p>\n \u201cShe looked high-end and well-fitted without being flashy,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n That sensibility has quietly shaped contemporary fashion<\/a>. Brands like The Row have built entire aesthetics around a similar vocabulary.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s always been there,\u201d Resnick Gick said. \u201cThat New York restraint. Masculine tailoring as empowerment.\u201d<\/p>\n What’s old is new again<\/p>\n There’s also been a resurgence of interest in \u201890s and Y2K fashion<\/a> in general, fashion industry observers say .<\/a> Vintage shopping has surged among Gen Z<\/a>. <\/p>\n Part of it is the cyclical nature of fashion \u2014 younger generations wanting to express their own sensibilities, and perhaps seeing the styles of their childhoods as retro, quaint or nostalgic<\/a>. <\/p>\n Danielle O\u2019Connell, a 30-year-old stylist in New York, said that after years dominated by casual streetwear, maximalist branding and algorithm-friendly spectacle, some fashionistas are swinging back toward polish. To dress a client attending the \u201cLove Story\u201d premiere, O\u2019Connell and her Los Angeles-based partner, Alix Gropper, naturally turned to Bessette Kennedy as a reference point. <\/p>\n \u201cWe wanted that quiet luxury moment,\u201d O\u2019Connell said.<\/p>\n Shades of Princess Di and Ralph Lauren<\/p>\n Natalie Decleve, a New York-based homes and style designer, says Bessette Kennedy\u2019s \u201cclean, classic, old-money” style has an American vibe akin to Ralph Lauren<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s that same language,\u201d Decleve said. \u201cA very clean version of the \u201990s.\u201d<\/p>\n