DAKOTA

The star of Persuasion shares some surprising truths about her rise as an actor, producer and fashion muse.

- Britt Hennemuth

Dakota Johnson is proud of her vibrator. The actor, producer and fashion muse is due on the carpet at the Met Gala soon, and her hair and makeup teams are applying their finishing touches in a suite at New York’s Crosby Street Hotel. Turns out Johnson included a touch all her own – she used a vibrator on her face this morning as a makeshift lymphatic drainage massager. The device was from Maude, the sexual wellness company she joined in 2020 as co-creative director. “It’s not for your face but it’s good,” she says.

“You showed me how to use it on my face,” says Kate Young, her long-time stylist and date for the night. Young turns to me and points to her cheeks, “I use her vibrator.”

Johnson smiles. “My personal one.”

She’s still in grey trackpants, sitting patiently as the teams scurry around. “I’m on a conveyor belt of beauty treatments,” she says. “You know that scene in The Wizard of Oz? One of them is getting stuffed with hay, and the Tin Man is getting polished. I feel like that’s me.”

Tonight she will be wearing a custom beaded lace Gucci bodysuit, which is hanging on a door nearby. The house’s designer, Alessandro Michele, was a close friend before Johnson came on as a brand ambassador in 2017. “We talk a lot, we text,” she says. “I don’t feel he’s elsewhere when I speak to him, which I feel most of the time when I speak to people who work in fashion.”