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This time of year, as temperatures toggle between optimistically mild and crushingly cold, the memes about New York’s 12 seasons of weather start making the rounds. This is not to be confused with last week’s calendar-dictated arrival of spring. Right now, according to a website keeping tabs, we are hovering in the Spring of Deception; ahead of us, in all likelihood, lies a Third Winter, followed by—even less fun—The Pollening.
What keeps New Yorkers spiritually afloat in this stretch are the flowers. Magnolias in voluptuous bloom on a neighborhood corner. Pioneering, semi-trampled daffodils in sidewalk gardens. Quince branches at the flower market. And, of course, those bottled up in the guise of perfume. As beauty companies angle to capitalize on a booming market, spring ushers in those bouquets too. Thus comes a fresh iteration of Viktor & Rolf’s Flowerbomb—named Tiger Lily after the speckled flame-orange bloom—with a new campaign face in Emily Ratajkowski, who signed on with the brand last year.
While this is not Ratajkowski’s first turn in the beauty ambassador space, she is pleased to find herself aligned with Viktor & Rolf’s flagship Perfume franchise. “I think people have this sense of, ‘Oh, it’s just this corporate whatever,’” she says, with the industry awareness we expect from the author of My Body, a book of essays that explores her early years in modeling and notions of commodification and ownership that arose. “But I met the man who was the nose [for the original Flowerbomb],” she continues, “and it’s really given me an appreciation for all the work that goes into building these fragrances.” After all, revisions in perfumery are called drafts; a finished work in the olfactive realm can be as layered as a novel, as personal as a memoir.
For Ratajkowski, who grew up in Southern California not far from San Diego, scent can be a nostalgia trip. “I am always, especially with beauty, trying to chase that feeling of being on a beach, having spent the day in the sun, and getting ready for evening after you have sand a little bit in your hair,” she says. Tiger Lily, with accords that tie in coconut milk, mango, and the namesake flower, is a fast-track to vacation mode. “It has this tropical sexiness to it,” she says, envisioning a perfect day in Mexico: reading in the sun, margarita at lunch, slip dress for dinner with friends. Flowers, wielded in the best ways, have the power to shift the narrative. To that end, here follows a roving conversation about exactly that, from Georgia O’Keeffe watercolors to Loewe’s anthurium obsession. Stop and smell, if you will.
Vanity Fair: Tell me about your childhood bedroom decor. Were you a part of the floral bedspread, late-stage Laura Ashley cohort?
Emily Ratajkowski: Absolutely. My mom loved Laura Ashley. I actually remember at some point when I was 9 or 10, she was like, “Laura Ashley’s going out of business”—which was not accurate, but somehow somebody had told her that—and she went and bought even more Laura Ashley. So there was a lot of Laura Ashley in my home. But I think by the time I was 12, or maybe even younger, I was like, I’m too cool for this. I painted my bedroom walls blue, pink, and lime green.
All at the same time?
Yeah, each wall had its own color, and I just thought it was so cool. Of course, I made the room super dark.
What flowers did you grow up with in Southern California?
There were a lot of cactuses with flowers. We also had [ornamental] plum trees in my front yard, so those were really beautiful. I always think about eucalyptus and Torrey pines, which is a pine tree that’s regional to San Diego and North County specifically—they each have really distinct smells.
Did you go through any phases with scent as a teen—a certain floral body mist you were obsessed with, or a perfume that crystallized your 16-year-old self?
It was Be Delicious by DKNY. It was shaped like a [green] apple, and I always had a fantasy about living in New York. The ad had this big New York skyline and this really beautiful girl with green eyes and freckles, and I just remember being like, That’s who I want to be. I would douse my clothes in that fragrance. It was sickening [laughs].
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