Why the A-list love Bella Freud's couch
Bella Freud is a fashion designer, the daughter of a famous portraitist (Lucian) and the great-granddaughter of the founding father of psychoanalysis (Sigmund). Her podcast Fashion Neurosis with Bella Freud knowingly draws on this background. In each episode she invites a well-known guest to sit for her — or actually, lie on her couch, as if in a therapy session — then asks them about their lifelong relationship with clothes as a way into bigger themes.
It is a strong format, instantly conferring structure and intimacy. Clothes can offer our first shot at self-expression and have a transformative, talismanic effect. But outfits can be what we hide behind too. Even celebrated beauties, you learn here, lack confidence and have complex relationships with their bodies.
Freud, who has been in analysis for years, makes tongue-in-cheek nods to the therapy process. This is a visualised podcast, one of the few that might merit watching over just listening: Freud sets her stage stylishly, with precise attention to details like lighting. Each episode begins with the client being buzzed into Freud's consulting room. A metronome or old-fashioned clock ticks. Moody piano music plays. The camera lingers over arresting black-and-white portraits, among them a teenage Bella with her father.
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