There is so much gorgeousness in the world today coming out of some incredible ladies who are accomplished, driven, and express themselves with completely individual style. I want to take the Monday blues and bathe in inspiration – for both new looks AND life goals. Monday Muse will hopefully be the space where I can do that regularly.

This week’s Monday Muse has a special distinction: She is a celebrity of whose work I know absolutely nothing.  Not one thing.  I mean, I know of the things she’s been in, but I haven’t actually seen them.  I even want to see at least a couple of things, and I just haven’t yet.  Ugh.  What a  monster I am.

How, then, could she possibly be a Monday Muse?  This woman’s style is so utterly distinctive, that every single time I open a magazine and see her photo at an event, I think, “It’s her again!  That woman who pulls off these incredible, chic, cool looks so effortlessly!”  I honestly think she’s the only person I’ve ever learned the name of purely by admiring her clothes; usually I’ve seen at least something of the work of someone whose style I love.

Oh, duh.  I haven’t even said who it is yet.  It’s Ruth Negga!

So.  A brief synopsis: Ms. Ruth Negga is an actress on the television show Preacher and starred in the movie Loving, a role for which she was nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress.  (I really want to watch Preacher but honestly, I heard it was pretty violent and gross, so . . . ?  I dunno, I have a feeling this is gonna be a thing I do.  If I got through American Horror Story: Asylum I can get through anything; spoiler alert, a dude legit wears a woman’s face, stay the fuck away!)

ANYWAY.  Back to the Lady Herself.

As I said, each and every time I see Ruth Negga in a magazine, she looks perfect.  Now, in a way I guess, so does everyone else.  But there’s something so distinctive about how she styles herself – when a person looks too perfect, you actually don’t really notice.  Have you noticed that?  No?  You didn’t notice?  Or you did?  Sorry.  There’s this sort of . . . generic quality to a lot of Hollywood glam.  Not even that most clothes are “safe,” more that they’re just expected.  Most actresses, for example, have bangin’ bodies, and good for them; but it means that almost everything they wear is going to look great (also good for them) and therefore there’s little wiggle room to actually show a lot of personal style.

My fascination with Ms. Negga is her crazy ability to wear what would look like period costumes on literally anyone else.  She has this gorgeous, heart-shaped face and usually wears her hair short, which enhances a whole 1920s or 1930s vibe, which she totally plays up.

The waves in her hair, plus those INSANE, INTENSE Art Deco earrings . . . I’m fucking dying.  And the thing is, I think it would look utterly stupid on 90% of people.  You simply must posses a certain look, physically, to pull this off without looking like some nerdy drama kid that got into the costume trunk.  Also, one thing you should know about me is that a red lip is the surest way to my heart – I’m behind you with that red lip, 100%, forever and always.

One thing Ruth Negga does repeatedly that most people don’t do once is also something close to my heart: A high neck.  This woman has never met a high neck she hasn’t liked, and for good reason: It looks fantastic on her.  Again, how do you not look grandma in these?  Well, I suppose by keeping shapes, colors, and patterns (i.e., the rest of the ensemble) relatively modern and fresh.  As a person who wears turtlenecks from October til March, and strongly believes that a black turtleneck with a high bun turns you instantly into an all-powerful witch, I’m ready to worship at the altar of Ms. Negga.

I love, love, love the left photo’s dark, jewel-toned fall florals, and the quirk of the pink shoes in the photo on the right.  On the left, this is a dress we’ve seen everywhere both this past fall and the one before; I just went to H&M, and there are probably a dozen different “fall floral” dresses, some even with high necks and perhaps a bit of a puff on the sleeve.  But add a fuschia lip, as she’s done here, with that nice turquoise ring, and it’s fresh but also totally suits her.

This is another one of her witchy abilities: She doesn’t look try-hard when she does something a bit whimsical or fun.  The slight “off”-ness of the pink shoes in the second photo brings the whole thing to a different level – a level away from costume.  The fur stole paired with the black ribbon neck might have been a bit too on the nose, but the pink shoes are all, “Hey!  I’m hot but also have fun!”  (The shoes are pointy, that’s how I know they know they’re hot; also, clunky square shoes would have also immediately turned it into a costume.)

Getting back to high necks – which are totally just a big arrow to her beautiful face – she likes them so much, she did them for the Oscars.

Lace + a high neck would usually equal “Victorian ghost haunting your house,” but the sheerness of the neck, plus the fiery red color, gives it more of a romantic edge than an old-fashioned one.  I love that she wore this for when she was nominated for Loving, because this dress is basically a valentine.

I should point out, though, that Ms. Negga’s fashion is much more diverse than I’m perhaps letting on.  While she certainly gets her period-pieces on, sometimes that time period is less “romantic Victorian” and more “swingin’ 70s”!

I’m absolutely in love with that blouse.  Gimme a disco ball and . . . well, whatever else was popular in the 70s and I’ll wear that right to town!  You’ve still got a bit of the romance with the puffs at the top of the sleeves, and if this blouse were paired with a high-waisted, long A-line skirt, it might even be an awards show type of deal.  Instead, she puts on some high-waisted white pants (drool) with a big fat belt and safety pins, and it becomes a little bit more cool.  She’s got the disco of the 70s mixed with the punk of the late 70s, early 80s, and I’m into it all.

I also just had to share this one:

I.  Am.  Crying.  I love this so, so much.  It’s just so rich looking and suave and classic yet unique.  I can’t tell if this is one or two pieces, but the color matching is dead-on; each piece alone would be too boring, but the monochromatic quality of this makes it almost alien-modern.  The fabric is such a plus throwback, to so many eras!  It’s romantic and soft like something Victorian, but the actual color is so . . . 80s?  70s again?  Our family couch had this color (and fabric) in it growing up in the 80s, and I mean this as the best compliment, and even knowing that, this outfit doesn’t look dated or weird to me.  Maybe it’s the cut of the fabrics?  The pleats in the skirt?  I feel like it’s three different time periods in one, and they all work.  This is, again, something only maybe 2% of the population could pull off, and Ruth Negga does it beautifully.

I shouldn’t, though, paint Ms. Negga as a one-trick pony; she certainly knows what she looks good in and repeats cuts a lot (again, high necks and florals), but that’s just good common sense.  Don’t fix what isn’t broken, yanno?  But sometimes she gets a good bit away from the 20s, 30s, and 40s styles she seems to be most comfortable in, and goes totally in the direction of Modern Hollywood Star, like at the Palm Springs Film Festival last year:

I mean, there it is.  It seems like a total left turn, but we’ve got the romance and that’s all that matters.  That richness and texture and sumptuousness with which she wears clothes – like she loves clothes.  That, I think, is why, despite having no idea who she was, I learned about her just from her style.  Because after all: If you’re doing something totally un-copy-able, you’re doing it totally right.