The costume designer behind The Devil Wears Prada 2 has distanced itself from one of the most talked-about fashion moments in the film’s trailers, and the story behind how those Valentino Rockstud heels ended up on Miranda Priestly’s feet is a tale to behold.
Molly Rogers revealed to Vogueand explains that the bold red and gold studded shoes that appeared in a widely discussed trailer image were never her choice.
She had already traveled to Milan to film when the decision was made without her.
“I had gone up to Milan where we were going to shoot some scenes. I wasn’t there that day when they shot another scene and they just put the shoes on Meryl. I had chosen a different shoe,” she said.
What followed was a frantic series of phone calls.
“I got panicked phone calls from assistants saying the marketing team had decided they liked this other shoe, which I took a lot of offense at the time because I knew a marketing person didn’t know anything about a Rockstud and I didn’t think it was appropriate for Miranda to wear a Rockstud.”
She added with characteristic dry humor: “From afar I sent needles into voodoo dolls.”
Rogers pointed out that costume decisions for a character as precisely defined as Miranda Priestly require a level of expertise that goes far beyond liking a shoe.
“You could give most of us, especially me, a rack full of white blouses and I could pick the one that Miranda wanted to wear and the one that Emily wanted to wear and the one that Annie wanted to wear. There are nuances, like the two blue belts in the first movie.”
She was measured on the response the shoe received online.
“When I saw the fuss about that shoe, I thought I’m innocent. I’m happy if people like it because it’s a callback or whatever, but if you don’t like it, I understand that too.”
Rockstud, it turns out, was a deliberate marketing placement.
The style originally debuted in Valentino’s fall 2010 collection and has since been updated by current creative director Alessandro Michele.
Valentino’s head of integrated marketing confirmed the strategic intent on LinkedIn, noting that the trailer had generated hundreds of millions of impressions with the brand at the center.
Rogers also shared a warm detail about the Valentino connection to the franchise, noting that the founder himself, likely a reference to Valentino Garavani, who died in January, had told Streep while on vacation in Italy that whatever she needed, he would provide.
The Devil Wears Prada 2 opens May 1.
