Dressing Bridget Jones in her 50s: The ‘Frazzled Englishwoman’ grows up

Costume designer Molly Emma Rowe discusses her approach to dressing Bridget Jones in a new chapter of her life.

Twenty-four years since actor Renée Zellweger first appeared in the film adaptation of Helen Fielding’s literary bestseller “Bridget Jones’s Diary,” she’s back for her fourth turn as an endearing, klutzy character looking for love. Although this time, in “Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy,” she’s no longer a carefree young woman, but a widow in her 50s, with two kids. Jones’s personal style — a quirky, at times ill-fitting wardrobe of short skirts, cleavage-revealing tops, mumsy cardigans, granny pants and long scarves — helped cement her character into an unforgettable part of noughties pop culture history. Though, this wasn’t the intention of costume designer Rachael Fleming. When creating the outfits for the first 2001 Bridget Jones cast, Fleming sought to give Jones — whose diary entries detailed her romantic adventures, weight, and alcohol and cigarette consumption — a pragmatic, somewhat disheveled look that would feel relatable to busy women. It’s a perspective that feels even more pertinent now in a glossy world of seemingly perfect and photoshopped images. The style has since spawned a microtrend coined as the “Frazzled Englishwoman” aesthetic, which encompasses the kind of haphazard layering often seen on British people because of the country’s unpredictable weather. Think of a jilted Kate Winslet in “The Holiday” or a befuddled Keira Knightley in “Love Actually.” Such archetypes have also inadvertently appeared on the runways of luxury brands such as Chanel and Miu Miu. Maintaining a feeling of “authenticity” and being “rooted in reality” was crucial to Molly Emma Rowe, the costume designer for Bridget Jones’s latest big screen adaptation. “Bridget has some nice clothes, and she tries her best, but she sort-of always gets it a bit wrong. There’s always something a little bit off, whether it’s the fit, or the pattern or color clashing,” she told CNN over a phone call. In the new film, which releases in UK cinemas and on Peacock in the US on February 13, Rowe said there are fewer “iconic clothing moments” — such as the Playboy bunny outfit that Jones wore to the Tarts and Vicars party where almost nobody else is in costume, or the racy tiger-print underwear styled with nothing but a camisole and cardigan as she chased Mark Darcy (Colin Firth) in the snow. This time round, those kinds of “uncomfortable situations” simply don’t feature, added Rowe.