Can Dressbarn Be Cool? Hilary Rhoda, Chrissy Teigen, and Wilbur the Pig Vote Yes
Dressbarn is pulling a Laney Boggs on us. For years, it was considered one of the last places you would look to find stylish duds, but now the retailer, once an ugly ducking, is having its moment at the top of the stairs (cue that Sixpence None the Richer track). This year, Dressbarn underwent an epic facelift, announcing collaborations with designers like Carmen Marc Valvo, unveiling the interactive Dressbar shop-in-shop and most recently, tapping Vogue’s go-to photog Patrick Demarchelier and model Hilary Rhoda for their fall campaign.
It’s clear that Dressbarn is serious about asserting itself as a serious competitor in the realm of affordable fashion, but they haven’t forgotten their roots. This season’s campaign is a quite literal play on the retailer’s name – we see Rhoda posing with chickens, goats and even a bull. If it’s Dressbarn you wanted, they’re giving it to you, with animals to boot. “Still hung up on the name?” one ad asks. “Don’t let the name fool you,” orders another. It appears to be working, even Chrissy Teigen Instagrammed a picture of their new billboards with the caption, “I like this.”
So on Wednesday night, Dressbarn fêted its fancy, fashion-y fall campaign with a party at Spring Studios in New York. Rhoda was there, looking ever the belle of the ball in a piece from Dressbarn’s Carmen Marc Valvo collaboration. One look at her in the campaign and you would swear that she was an animal tamer in her past life, but she says she had some help keeping her barnyard besties from getting too crazy on set.
“There were tamers in the background, they had treats for them,” she told us. But treats didn’t seem to be quite as effective for one of her fellow campaign stars, Wilbur, who turned out to be a bit of a diva. “The pig just kept wanting to walk away,” she said. “He was the last one of the day and we were just trying to get him to stay in his spot, and he was not having it!”
Hilary Rhoda works a Dressbarn piece like a pro. Photo: Getty
In an ironic twist, the animal that could have potentially caused the most damage on set turned out to (thankfully) be one of the calmest – Count, that enormous bull Rhoda poses with. “He was huge,” she said. “I was wearing 7-inch heels and he was still taller than me! Obviously, it’s just a massive animal. We had to keep it very quiet on set and calm – no sudden movements. That was the only intense part.”
It has been quite an eventful last few days for Ms. Rhoda. Just this weekend, she married her ex hockey-playing beau Sean Avery in quite an unconventional Carolina Herrera wedding dress. Sure, it was white, but it also had a sparkly green border around its plunging neckline – so much for something blue. It turns out, Rhoda’s friends at the house of Herrera still made sure the bride was adequately prepared for her big day.
Rhoda in her Carolina Herrera wedding dress. Photo: @houseofherrera/Instagram
“They sewed a blue bow underneath the dress and it was a little surprise,” she dished. “I didn’t know until after I put it on on my wedding day!” Rhoda said she felt compelled to do something different for her walk down the aisle after she was left cold trying on bridal dresses that didn’t really speak to her. "They didn’t really feel like me,” she admitted. “I saw a picture of Carolina’s daughter wearing a similar dress, so I said, ‘that’s what I want,’ and they made it and it was… perfect! It was comfortable, it was still special but it wasn’t big and crazy and poofy.”
We know what you’re thinking: what’s a newlywed model doing making appearances for brands instead of sitting on a beach somewhere, enjoying her honeymoon? Don’t worry – it’s on the agenda. “We just decided to do our honeymoon in January over the holidays because work gets really busy right now,” she told us. “I didn’t mind it. I said ‘why not?’ It’s going to be freezing in a couple months, and we’re gonna want to get the heck out of here.”
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