Really proud of this one… In October, about a month after she retired from Finnish politics, I flew to LA to spend time with Sanna Marin, the former prime minister of Finland, who when she was elected at age 34 in 2019, was the world’s youngest premier, male or female. In her nearly four years in office, she was praised for her deft handling of covid and Russia’s war in Ukraine. Yet despite her accomplishments, Marin is better known for her dance moves, following the leak of a video in August 2022 that showed her and her friends dancing at a private party, spurring a ridiculous tabloid scandal. “This is something no one wants to say: The problem wasn’t my dancing. The real problem was that I looked too ‘sexy,’” Marin told me. “It’s the way I danced, the way I performed. I looked the wrong way. I was too young. I dressed differently than people assumed. I moved in a way somebody thinks is incorrect.”
“It’s all related to the fact that we, as a society, still think that it is our right, and actually our obligation, to decide how women should act, behave, and look.”
Read my full profile, with photos by @mollymatalon and styling by @kevinleblanc , via the link in my bio or in the February 2024 issue of @elleusa
Before there was an Impossible Whopper, there was Chloe Coscarelli and her cashew cheese vegan burgers. She was the queen of plant-based eating before it was cool; a visionary young chef whose eponymous fast casual restaurant, By Chloe, taught diners that vegan versions of their favorite treats could be just as scrumptious.
And then, just as quickly as it had all began, the dream came crashing down. In 2017, she was pushed out of the business, leaving her legions of adoring, quinoa taco-salad addicted (hi, it me 🙋🏻♀️) fans to wonder, What happened to Chloe Coscarelli?
“Opening By Chloe was probably the best experience of my life,” Coscarelli told me when we sat down over butternut squash nachos last week. “And when I stepped away from By Chloe, that was probably the worst.” She spent the years that followed her exit waging a legal battle to win her business, and her name, back.
Now, in a full circle moment for the chef, she has opened a new restaurant in the same space where the original By Chloe was located. The “By” is gone, it’s just “chloe.” now. (The punctuation leaving no questions.) “All I could do was keep putting one foot in front of the other, and doing what I could to keep creating recipes, and working, and hoping that someday I would get my name back,” she says. “And now, here we are…”
Read my full profile of @chefchloe and her new spot @chloeonbleecker via the link in my bio. Photos by @_emilyteague and @sarahvanbolton .
7 nights in paradise 🩵🩵 20+ hours of travel each way, but oh so worth it. Thank you so much @fsmaldives Kuda Haraa and Landaa Giraavaru for hosting me for this once in a lifetime kind of trip!!! Between the gorgeous villas, the clear turquoise water, the otherworldly white sand, the delicious food, getting to snorkel with stingrays and scuba dive with 12 (!) turtles, and an incredible four spa treatments, I feel completely spoiled, fully relaxed, and very, very grateful. The only problem with all of this perfection is I may be ruined for all other beach destinations now…
Last month, I had the pleasure of chatting (and laughing, see no. 7) with Dakota and Elle Fanning about their production company and sharing the screen as sisters for the first time in their forthcoming adaptation of “The Nightingale.”
As I write, the Fanning sisters grew up on-screen, filming their first movie at the tender ages of 6 and 2, and it makes sense that after decades in front of the camera, they’d want to get behind it, too. They couldn’t be closer—in conversation, they finish each other’s sentences like twins—so when they decided to start a company, naturally they wanted to do it together. “I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Dakota told me. And “being able to come together just feels right,” Elle added.
Read the full interview via the link in my bio, and also be sure to check out our full “Women of Impact” portfolio, guest edited by our cover star @sofiacoppola , including an interview the eternally cool @kimletgordon (!)
Ladies and gentlemen, the wonderful, Raye…! ❤️ I had the pleasure of sitting down for dinner (swipe for v cute selfies) with the big-voiced British record-setter at Daniel, where we talked about her sophomore album, the self-work it took to make it, the hardships including sexual assault that she experienced coming up in the industry, her struggles with substance abuse, being compared to Amy Winehouse, and how she’s now making music that can serve as medicine both for herself and for the world.
This is Raye’s first major U.S. magazine cover, and it comes as she kicks off her latest tour and prepares to release her highly-anticipated sophomore album. As I write, for all Raye has accomplished, and for all she’s already had to overcome to make it to where she is today, it’s clear she is now on the precipice of a whole new level of fame. She’s up for the hustle, ready to do what it takes to achieve her American dreams, and I was happy to tell her story at this exciting moment.
ELLE: @elleusa
Editor-in-chief: Nina Garcia @ninagarcia
Photographer: Willy Vanderperre @willyvanderperre
Stylist: Paul Sinclaire @paulsinclaire
Writer: Kayla Webley Adler @kaylaw
Hair: Louis Ghewy at MA+ Talent @louisghewy@maworldgroup
Makeup: Lynsey Alexander at Jolly Collective @lynseyalexander@jollycollective
Manicure: Delphine Aïssi @delphineaissi
Production: One Thirty-Eight Productions @onethirtyeightproduction
What a week—from snowy mountains in Italy, to four days in a sunny island paradise…! 🩵 Grateful to Sandals Saint Vincent for hosting us in the best room in the resort—my first-ever overwater bungalow, complete with two floors, a peekaboo window to the sea below, a dreamy outdoor tub/shower, floaties, great food, white sand, turquoise water, and even a butler to maximize the vacay vibes (laziness).
Two months ago, I flew to LA to hang out with Colleen Hoover, who was in town working on three films, one of which was for the production company no one even knows she owns, until now. “Reminders of Him,” coming in March, is the first film she’s ever cowritten and coproduced; she was also on set in Calgary for all five months of filming (where many of these photos are from). Colleen said she wanted to have fruity cocktails and go shopping, and I told her she’d picked the right gal.
So over strawberry margaritas and Chanel, we discussed it all—her Hollywood ambitions, her next two books (surprise!), criticism of her writing and of her portrayal of domestic violence, and of course, “It Ends With Us,” how the legal drama tainted her most personal book (she doesn’t even like telling people she wrote it now 😢), and how all of it gives she and her mother ptsd now.
As I say in the story, the heights Hoover has reached would be vertigo-inducing for anyone, but especially for an author who famously started out self-publishing her novels by uploading them to Amazon from her single-wide trailer in small-town Texas. She knows her writing could be better, but she doesn’t care. Millions of people love reading her books, and she enjoys writing them. And now with “Regretting You,” another top-grossing movie in theaters despite bad reviews, she’s proving plenty of people enjoy watching her films, too.
I found her charmingly self-depreciating, incredibly generous, and a total hoot! I tried my best to capture all of that, and if you made it this far, I hope you’ll read my story too via the link in my bio.
As Adam Sandler said (swipe!), Women in Hollywood really is the best event…! Proud to have worked with the whole superstar team at ELLE to bring this issue—with 8 covers and 11 stars—and event to life. Dream team, dreamy night, never gets old. ✨
