Dua Lipa’s taste in books is rivaled only by her penchants for some very fabulous fashions. The singer has long made her literary tastes known through her successful Service95 Book Club, but this weekend, she took her love of the written word to the stage, curating a series of conversations for London’s Literature Festival at the Southbank Centre. Her wardrobe was just as carefully considered as her reading list.
On Saturday, Lipa played host to two literary heavyweights at the Royal Festival Hall: acclaimed novelist Zadie Smith, with whom she discussed White Teeth, Smith’s landmark 2000 debut, and Sudanese Canadian poet and musician Mustafa, whose 2025 poetry collection Nour explores love, grief, faith, and devotion. Two very different and expansive conversations, which required two different outfits.
For her time with Smith, Lipa continued her allegiance to Chanel for just about every occasion. This time, she opted for a tomato-red knitted dress from the fall 2026 collection, which features a dropped waist and fluffy embellishments at the elbows and hips. Lipa forwent the softer runway styling, and toughened up the ladylike silhouette with a pair of towering, lace-up black leather knee-high boots by Le Silla. Her dark hair was slicked back, and she accessorized with sculptural red earrings. Smith looked just as chic, choosing a draped black sleeveless top affixed with a brooch at the collar, oat-colored corduroy pants, and patent black heels.
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Later, for her evening conversation with Mustafa, Lipa turned to Prada, wearing a black Re-Nylon tank top with flashes of hot-pink bra straps peeking out at the shoulders and a matching pencil skirt. She also sported embroidered daisy cotton socks, pulled high up the calf, paired with white satin pumps trimmed with wispy feathers. She added oversized hoop earrings, a slicked-back bun, and dark manicured nails.
Photo: Getty Images
Lipa has wasted little time embracing fall fashion more broadly. In recent weeks, she’s been spotted out with husband Callum Turner in a litany of autumnal layers, from a sage-green Phoebe Philo trench for a dog walk to a fluffy Charlotte Simone Lila jacket, worn with jeans and chunky Chrome Hearts boots for a studio session in New York. Her off-duty wardrobe might be leaning into the season’s more bundled-up staples, but onstage and on the red carpet, she’s evidently still in the mood to experiment.
With Patti Smith next on her literary agenda today, Dua Lipa’s fashionable book tour continues. Expect that she has a few more chapters of great style up her sleeve.