How a last-minute request turned unknown actress Liz Hurley into household name
Looking at Liz Hurley's iconic safety pin dress, it would be easy to believe each pin was painstakingly secured against her skin to ensure that it didn't prick her in any way.
But the reality was quite the opposite. In fact, it was a last-minute request that led the then-unknown actress to become a household name.
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One of Liz Hurley's most famous looks was the result of a last-minute request. Getty
In 1994, Hurley found herself scrambling to find something appropriate to wear at the red carpet premiere of her boyfriend Hugh Grant's film Four Weddings and a Funeral.
The burgeoning actress had no clue how to go about acquiring such clothing from designers and began contacting fashion houses individually to ask for a dress to wear.
All rebuffed her except for one - she caught a break when she got Dean Aslett, Head of Womenswear and Atelier at the Versace Flagship Store on Old Bond Street on the phone.
He agreed to lend her the dress and in return she offered four tickets to the premiere, with Aslett taking some of his colleagues with him.
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"She shoved it on, and I raised my eyebrows a fraction, and we set off," Hugh Grant said of the dress. Getty
What they didn't know was that they would witness a pop culture moment in the making.
Once Hurley stepped onto the red carpet, Grant all but faded into the background.
The media was fascinated by her dress, which was made of black silk and Lycra, fashioned together with massive gold safety pins in "strategic places".
It featured a plunging neckline, two slimline straps, and was said to be inspired by the Indian sari, according to Gianni Versace himself.
Grant explained the viral moment in a BBC documentary, saying, "Poor Elizabeth rang some top designers, and they all said: 'No, who are you?' or 'No, we're not lending you anything'.
"Then Versace said: 'Yes, we'll lend you a dress', and they just sent one round, which is that one with the safety pins.
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"So she shoved it on, and I raised my eyebrows a fraction, and we set off."
The dress not only raised Hurley's profile but also that of the brand, making it a household name. It also revolutionised red carpet fashion, making it acceptable for stars to be more daring in their attire.
Of course, there were critics of the dress who vowed it as distasteful and revealing, to which Hurley simply replied, "Unlike many other designers, Versace designs clothes to celebrate the female form rather than eliminate it."
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The notoriety the dress brought Hurley served to launch her to stardom, with the actress finding her most famous roles after the media storm in Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery (1997) and as the Devil in Bedazzled (2000), among others.
The original gown became an attraction at the Victoria and Albert Museum's Versace retrospective in 2002.
It was sold in 2007 as part of Harrods Timeless Luxury and purchased for an eye-watering $20,711.
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The gown has since been replicated a number of times by Versace and other celebrities.
In 1995, Dawn French wore a copy of the dress in a sketch for the Comic Relief telethon; in 2012, Lady Gaga wore the dress to meet Donatella Versace in Milan.
Anne Hathaway stepped out at the 2023 Met Gala in a tweed safety pin dress made by Versace, which has reproduced various iterations of the gown.
Twenty-five years after setting the red carpet ablaze, Hurley herself showed us how it was done, recreated the look for a shoot for the US Harper's Bazaar.
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This iteration featured an asymmetrical long sleeve which offered a touch more mystery than the '94 version.
However, the thigh-high slit and over-sized gold hardware that changed fashion as we know it remained.
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