Look of the Week: Nicola Coughlan embodies steamy ‘Bridgerton’ season in red-hot couture

Editor’s Note: Featuring the good, the bad and the ugly, ‘Look of the Week’ is a regular series dedicated to unpacking the most talked about outfit of the last seven days.

(CNN) — “Bridgerton” fans haven’t been able to stop talking about that long-awaited carriage scene that closed out the first half of the hit Regency-era romance series’ third season on Netflix. And now, as stars Nicola Coughlan and Luke Newton, who play love interests Penelope Featherington and Colin Bridgerton (Polin, to the shippers), promote the remaining episodes, Coughlan is pulling out all the sartorial stops to match the romance of the season.

At the Toronto red-carpet premiere earlier this week, Coughlan stepped out in a structured lavender mini dress rippling with petal-like silk organza, paired with a voluminous red gathered cloak fit for early 19th-century yearning. The couture ensemble is by designer Sara Mrad and served as another example of Coughlan’s stylist, Aimée Croysdill, playing up the Irish actress’s curves with exaggerated silhouettes.

Coughlan has long been admired for her bold red-carpet looks — including her debut at the Met Gala in 2022 in an extravagant pink and black Richard Quinn ball gown — but she’s amplified her style on her “Bridgerton” press tour. In April, she glimmered at a London event in a sculptural 22-karat gold-plated corset by MISHO that featured an anatomical heart. Last month, she wore a dramatic white peplum hourglass gown by Danielle Frankel to the New York premiere. (Nearly all her looks have also been accessorized with a red pin that signals her support for a ceasefire in Palestine, too).

This season has been a milestone for her character Penelope, who takes the spotlight at court, and Coughlan. As the former “Derry Girls” actor has stepped into the role of leading lady, she’s intentional about how she wants to be portrayed.

“There’s one scene where I’m very naked on camera, and that was my idea, my choice. It just felt like the biggest ‘f*** you’ to all the conversation surrounding my body; it was amazingly empowering,” she told Stylist magazine earlier this year, which was reported on by BuzzFeed.

And though Coughlan’s power dressing can speak for itself, the actor has been candid with her fans about what’s appropriate and what isn’t, writing on Instagram earlier this year that “it’s really hard to take the weight of thousands of opinions on how you look being sent directly to you every day.”

But she’s also responded with wit that rivals Penelope’s. At the Dublin premiere, she was asked about her “bravery” in showing her body on screen. She replied: “You know it is hard because I think women with my body type –— women with perfect breasts — don’t get to see ourselves on screen enough.”

“I hope you enjoy them,” she added.

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