SHINING BRIGHT

Sarah Jessica Parker on her fashion quirks, balancing family with work and why lab-grown diamonds are a girl's best friend

- BECKY DONALDSON & MELANIE BROMLEY

On a crisp, sunny afternoon just two days after New York Fashion Week draws to a close, Manhattan shimmers with early autumn colours as HELLO! heads to the newly opened Faena Hotel on the West Side to meet one of the city’s ultimate style icons: Sarah Jessica Parker, the actress who brought Carrie Bradshaw to life in Sex and the City across six seasons on HBO from 1998 to 2004, followed by two feature films and, most recently, the reboot of the series, And Just Like That.

The on-screen style heroine served up countless scene-stealing looks: the tiered tutu and pale-pink tank top that became instantly famous in the show’s opening sequence, the newspaper dress from John Galliano’s Fly Girl collection and the billowing seafoam green Atelier Versace Mille Feuille gown that she wore for a date in Paris with Aleksandr Petrovsky that never happened.

In reality, Sarah Jessica has the same love of high drama as the character she immortalised. Consider her 12 showstopping Met Gala moments, including in 2006, when she arrived on the arm of Lee McQueen, founder of Alexander McQueen, wearing a one-shoulder tartan gown custom-made by the late designer to fit the theme Anglomaniac: Tradition and Transgression in British Fashion.

But today, the actress, producer and entrepreneur, who turned 60 in March, is wearing a demure black dress, her honey-toned curls tamed into a glossy wave, with a light smattering of gloss on her lips, subtly smoky eyes and an immaculate complexion.