Taylor Swift Wore a Dress From Adelaide Label Paolo Sebastian in Her Latest Music Video

The world seemed to stop for a few minutes over the weekend when Taylor Swift dropped the music video for The Fate of Ophelia, the lead track of her 12th studio album, The Life of a Showgirl. While fans of Swift were busy spouting theories and decoding Easter eggs, Adelaide-based fashion designer Paul Vasileff had his own reason to hit the replay button: the global pop superstar donned a gown from his label Paolo Sebastian.

“I didn’t know it would be featured in [the] music video until it went live,” Vasileff tells Broadsheet. “We found out with the rest of the world. I was getting ready to board a flight to Dubai and saw some images of Taylor in the dress, along with a short clip from the video. It was so hard to sit on a plane for 12 hours disconnected from everything, wanting to see more.”

In a dramatic theatre scene set on a ship’s bow, Swift appears in a hand-beaded, exposed corset-cage gown adorned with paillette and crystal work, including a jewelled garnet heart pierced by an arrow. The look, one of many that Swift wears throughout the video, is from Paolo Sebastian’s 2024–25 autumn/winter couture collection, A Lover’s Kiss, inspired by Shakespeare’s great romances. The pairing feels like kismet as Swift sings about her own love story.

It’s not the first time the singer has sported a look from an Australian designer. Last year she was spotted in Dion Lee’s crochet Suspend corset at the Super Bowl while cheering on now-fiancé Travis Kelce, ahead of the Australian leg of the Eras Tour.

For Vasileff, whose designs have been worn by star names including Kim Kardashian, Katy Perry and Anya Taylor-Joy, the pop cultural moment is a proud one for his Adelaide couture house.

“I feel incredibly grateful and so excited to know that something that was handcrafted in Adelaide has now been showcased on a global stage,” he says. “Hearing from followers who recognised the dress as a Paolo Sebastian design before it was officially announced was such a wonderful compliment. Knowing that people from around the world can identify our work like that is an accomplishment for the brand.”

When it comes to telling a story through fashion, both Swift and Paolo Sebastian certainly know how to make the whole place shimmer.