Inside the mirrored halls of the Fifth Avenue Hotel, the Portrait Bar was packed with guests and flashing camera bulbs on Thursday evening. The cause for celebration? Stylist Erin Walsh, who brought together a starry room to launch her new book, The Art of Intentional Dressing.
During the cocktail reception, Walsh—outfitted in the same cotton candy pink Oscar de la Renta dress that appears on the cover—was joined by her family, longtime clients Anne Hathaway, Ariana DeBose, and Beanie Feldstein, and friends including Stella McCartney, Prabal Gurung, Jennifer Fisher, Fernando Garcia, Tanner Ritchie, and Fletcher Kassell.
“Being here with all these people, honestly, it’s very overwhelming,” Walsh told Vogue. “I love what I do, and I love the people and the women that I get to work with who inspire me. I’m humbled and moved by that process. Feeling this support, it’s very cool.”
Walsh’s idea for the tome came to her a decade ago, stemming from the anxious feelings her friends and clients had when choosing what to wear. In the pandemic’s early days, Walsh—who suddenly had time on her hands—sat down and began working on the pages, with the goal of emphasizing, as the name implies, how to dress and live a more intentional life.
The result is a book filled with both styling tips and advice for staying enriched and grounded, from editing your closet to visualization, Feng Shui tactics, and integrating scents into your getting ready routine. The volume also includes anecdotes and interviews with fashion plates like Rachel Zoe, Zanna Roberts Rassi, Mariska Hargitay, and Diane von Furstenberg—whose original style advice became a core tenet for Walsh.
“When we were talking, Diane said, ‘I live my life by this rule of intention: every single day, I ask myself, ‘Who is that woman that I want to be? What does she feel like? What does she embody?’ It’s by doing that—deciding what you wear, who you surround yourself with, what your surroundings look like, your energetic choices—that you find alignment.”
Walsh’s book debuts during an especially busy season for the stylist, who—in addition to her upcoming La Ligne collaboration and partnerships with brands like Quince and Freda Salvador—has been outfitting Anne Hathaway on her whirlwind international press tour for The Devil Wears Prada 2 and overlapping appearances to promote Mother Mary. During their fashion-filled trek of the globe, Walsh utilized the advice from her own book to stay cool, calm, and collected: “I had to lean on this method more than ever,” said Walsh. “When you’re jet-lagged AF, and you feel overwhelmed and frazzled…think: ‘What are my three words that I need to feel today so that I can be of service, and be that woman that I want to be?’ That brought me through it, gave me clarity, and made me feel grounded and centered—even in a time of hectic juggling.”
Ultimately, she hopes readers can tap into clothing’s power to influence your mood and behaviors every day. Guests each left with a copy, ready to step into the world and utilize her wisdom. “You have to ask yourself every single day: how do I want to feel? That’s how you get back into the intention and integrity of the best version of yourself and who you want to be,” Walsh told Vogue. “You take that energy into your closet—and that’s when your closet, instead of being a place of overwhelm, becomes an empowering portal of possibility.”
The Art of Intentional Dressing is out on May 5.
