Isabella Rossellini needs no introduction. In Rome to walk the Pucci Spring show, where she closed with regal grace to much applause; she was part of an age-diverse casting that also included fellow supermodels Christy Turlington and Eva Herzigova. Rossellini’s modeling and acting career has spanned decades; it took a turn for the controversial in 1993, when, after a ten years run as the radiant face of Lancôme beauty, she was dumped at 40 because she wasn’t age-appropriate enough to represent an audience that “according to the management’s marketing research, apparently only dreamed of being young,” she explained backstage at the show. It was a decision that rightly sparked outrage, but times were still not ready for a contrite “sorry, we apologize, we made a mistake” public statement. But as the saying goes, you just have to sit on the river bank, and wait. Two decades later, the brand called her back.
In the meantime, her life has bloomed in different, intriguing directions, a testament to her belief that “creativity is ageless.” She resumed her studies and graduated in ethology, earning a Master in Animal Behavior; opened a regenerative farm (Mama Farm) in Brookhaven, New York, where she focuses on conservation and biodiversity, raising rare breeds of chickens that make extraordinary eggs in delicate artistic colors, and mellow sheeps from whose abundant woolly locks a fine cashmere yarn is produced. She also writes books, makes short movies, and tours theaters with her company, Link Link Circus. She’s living proof that energy, if fueled by nurturing passions, doesn’t attenuate with age—quite the contrary. It increases in focus and intelligent dedication.
Rossellini has always been vocal about beauty and age; I sat down with her backstage before the Pucci show to talk about how the industry has (and hasn’t) changed since her ‘90s Vogue Italia cover, shot by Meisel and styled by Carlyne Cerf de Dudzeele, where she was clad in Pucci, looking like a young, irresistible Sophia Loren.
What do you remember of that ‘90s Vogue Italia shoot with Steven Meisel?
At that time I was working as a model. It was a time when Steven (Meisel) was inspired by strong, potent female figures, women of charisma like Maria Callas, or Marlene Dietrich — he liked not her stage images, rather the more intimate portraits taken by Alex Lieberman, where her gestures exuded a natural appeal. Together we did lots of editorials, intended as homages to these extraordinary women, and he asked me to be part of a shoot styled by Carlyne about Pucci. Obviously I knew Pucci, because in the ‘60s it had tremendous success, I was a little girl at the time but my mother (Ingrid Bergman) had a few Pucci dresses; they synced up with her style, she was Swedish and had lived in America, so she favored a sense of simple, practical elegance. Pucci was a sort of revolution in those days, it seemed unbelievable that women would dress up in Pucci pajamas in their everyday life and for parties, it was so different from the uptight, bourgeois and formal style then culturally in vogue; there was an ease that felt incredibly new. It was utterly modern. You could wear the same dress from morning to evening, you just had to add some jewelry and off you’d go to a party. That’s why my mother liked it so much, it was so chic and comfortable. I was looking at her thinking: one day I could wear it too!
So that shoot brought you back to personal memories.