Anne Hathaway just gave new meaning to the word “shirtdress.” The actor flew to Rome for a Bulgari event (she’s an ambassador for the luxury jewellery company) and paired her glittering gems with a semi-sheer white button-down dress…that was also a shirt…that was also a dress.
Let’s examine said dress, shall we? As noted by Vogue, Anne Hathaway’s garment was custom GAP via its creative director, designer Zac Posen. The dress takes the idea of a shirtdress and turns it on its head with clever little styling tricks. One shoulder was bare, with the sleeve falling off her shoulder into the crook of her elbow. She wore the full-length dress semi-unbuttoned at both the top and the skirt to reveal a little skin, not to mention a corset underneath the “shirt” portion of said dress.
Franco Origlia
Elisabetta Villa/Getty Images
So what is this? A dress, or a shirt? In the immortal words of that little girl from the commercial, why not both? Vogue compared the dress to Tom Cruise’s underwear moment in the classic movie Risky Business, but to us, it looks more like when you wear your dad’s shirt as a kid or that iconic moment when Carrie Bradshaw wears one of Mr. Big’s shirts with no pants and an Hèrmes belt. If this were 2004, she’d probably wear a pair of flare jeans underneath said dress and unbutton the entire skirt to show them off, a styling decision blast from the past — and one Hathaway has worn in the past.
All jokes aside, the dress is super chic, especially when paired with all that jewellery. It’s a little preppy, a little sexy, and yes, a little confusing too. It’s unlikely you’ll be able to snap up this dress at your local Gap, given that it was a custom piece by Posen for Hathaway, but you never know!
This article originally appeared on Teen Vogue.