Emily Ratajkowski has walked hundreds, if not thousands of red carpets, but the Harper’s Bazaar Icons Party in September 2016 stands out above the rest. It was the night the model and author wore what she called her “most controversial dress.”
While appearing on the Harper’s Bazaar’s “Fashion Flashback” series on YouTube, Ratajkowski was shown a picture of a memorable Julien Macdonald dress that Pop Sugar described as “two strips of sparkly duct tape.” It was “probably the most controversial dress I’ve ever worn,” Ratajkowski said. “This caused such a… I had no idea what a scene this would cause.” She remembers somebody calling it “extremely vulgar and, like, it became this huge controversy on the internet and some of my agents were mad at me because they thought it was too sexy, or whatever.” A controversy on the internet? Over a woman’s looks? Well, now I’ve heard everything.
Ratajkowski was in her 20s at the time, and she “hadn’t registered that it was so sexy, because there is a panel in the middle, but it looks like there isn’t. And yeah, it caused this whole thing. And then I basically called the person who said it was a vulgar dress ‘sexist’ and there was drama.” Despite all the controversy, Ratajkowski (who’s used to the drama about her body) still likes the dress, and still thinks she looked “great” in it.
You can watch the video where Ratajkowski discusses the dress above.