Rewrite
At 19, Florence Hunt is stepping into society, on screen and off. In Bridgerton, she’s Hyacinth, the youngest Bridgerton daughter biding her time as the belle of the ball. Off screen, she’s already the talk of the ton – and a Dior girl under Jonathan Anderson.
“It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife,” Jane Austen wrote. Two centuries on, another rule has quietly taken hold: that a young woman on the brink of stardom will, inevitably, be claimed by a major fashion house.
For actor Florence Hunt, warm and sharp-witted in equal measure, that rite of passage arrives in the form of a Dior ambassadorship, announced alongside the release of Bridgerton’s fourth season. Best known for playing Hyacinth Bridgerton – the youngest daughter of the show’s sprawling Regency clan – Florence was just 11 years old when she was cast in the series’ first outing.
Now 19, Florence is back on our screens – whether that screen is a television, a laptop, or, as I clocked on the Tube the other day, an iPhone – ushering her once-peripheral character further into the orbit of the ton. Hyacinth, no longer a child observer, is inching closer to society’s centre, impatiently awaiting her own moment to debut. This Dior role feels like a kind of coming-out of your own, I tell Florence over Zoom – albeit in a glossy, 21st-century It-girl sense.
“Yeah!” she laughs, delighted. “I love that.”
“It’s so exciting,” Florence continues, bubbly and vivacious, sitting in front of what looks like a wardrobe. “It’s absolutely wild. It’s just one of those things you never, ever consider would be an opportunity for you. And I’m so grateful to Jonathan and everyone at Dior who’s trusted me with this title.”
For it’s not just Bridgerton undergoing a new season. Having joined the fashion house last April, creative director Jonathan Anderson is still within his first year at the helm of Dior. “I’m obsessed with fashion – the whole fashion world,” Florence effuses. “I’m very grateful to be able to get a closer look at everything.”
With other young actors Sophie Wilde and Ever Anderson also announced, it’s not just a declaration of bright young thing status, but a clear vote of confidence in Florence as part of the next generation of women in film.
And yet Florence is not taking any of this for granted. “Dior, and then Bridgerton coming out,” she says, sounding slightly awed as she recites it back to me. “It’s all coming into fruition. All at the same time. I feel very grateful.”
It’s all happening at full speed. It is also somewhat entwined.
“You’re surrounded by the greatest, most talented dressmakers and designers,” Florence says of the iconic Bridgerton wardrobe, where Regency attire is lavishly romanticised for grand, maximalist effect. She tells me she recently brought her grandmother to “the warehouse where they make all of the Bridgerton costumes. It’s insane – the amount of work and dedication and love that goes into it.”
Hyacinth’s wardrobe in particular has been noticeably elevated this series, reflecting the character’s transition from child to someone with her own scenes and storyline. This isn’t subtle: the season opens with Hyacinth proudly declaring that Violet has given her blessing for her youngest daughter to lower her hemline – an era-appropriate marker of a girl becoming a woman. “It’s great to see Hyacinth growing up,” Florence continues. “The costumes and the hair and the make-up and everything changes as you grow up. It’s fun, isn’t it?”
As is the consistent charm of the show, Bridgerton grounds real emotional experience within a semi-historical framework. More confident and ambitious than its rom-com peers – and considerably more fun than many period dramas – this is a corsets-and-carriages universe where handsome men pine, strong-willed women win, and string quartets play Taylor Swift.
And, as I said, people are streaming it on the Tube. “I think what’s so great about the show is that every season, people relate to the character in the spotlight,” Florence says of its enduring popularity. “Everyone has their own favourite season, which is such a great part of the show. And that’s one of the geniuses of Shonda [Rhimes].”
Naturally, it’s not just the costumes – or even the characters – that bring audiences, nearly 40 million for the fourth season, back every few years. First released during lockdown, the Netflix series continues to be devoured for its escapist pull, a reminder of how deeply audiences still crave fantasy comfort viewing.
“The ball at the beginning was so much fun to film,” Florence continues, after I mention how much I enjoyed the post-debutante sequence. “I mean, I was there for maybe two days, but just being on set – seeing people in these crazy costumes – you’re like, how is this real life? There’s just the most creative people putting this enormous ball together. It was really, really special.”
Within the first episode alone, Hyacinth manages to sneak into the ton’s annual masked ball, the first clear signal of her expanded storyline this season: a bold child growing into a headstrong teenager. In a show that ricochets between plotlines – a Cinderella romance, Lady Danbury’s retirement, class consciousness via a housemaid shortage in Mayfair – Hyacinth’s scenes, now propelled forward as a primary narrative thread, bring an often-needed sense of youth and vitality. Florence plays her with both the fierceness of the confident youngest sister and the vulnerability of a girl yearning for her life to begin.
You cannot help but empathise with Hyacinth. It’s not simply a desire to grow up or join her older siblings, but something more acute and poignant: an awareness of where she would like to be, paired with the frustration of not yet being able to get there. Florence’s performance captures the desperation to belong, the thrum of anticipation, the impatience of adolescence – without tipping into self-pity. Hyacinth’s wit and self-possession, coupled with her unapologetic understanding of herself, neatly halt any slide into victimhood. Little wonder that, with only four of the eight episodes released as we speak in January, fans are already rushing to immortalise her across TikTok edits and stan videos.
How much does Florence relate to her character at this particular moment in Hyacinth’s arc, I ask. “I feel like I am on the same journey as any girl,” she says thoughtfully, pausing to consider her words. “Maturing and learning about the world. It’s exciting to see what they write for her – what Jess [Brownell] and all the writers do with Hyacinth – because I care about her so much.” She pauses again, then smiles. “And you naturally do, pretending to be this person for so long. You can’t help but care deeply – maybe too deeply – about that character.”
I joke that audiences have been breadcrumbed – to repurpose the Gen Z dating term – into rooting for Hyacinth since the very first season. Despite being a stickler for society rules – the girl cannot wait to come out – she has always been an independent thinker within the world she was raised in. She was the first to reassure her brother Colin that his plot-defining flirtation lessons with Penelope Featherington last season were, in fact, an admirable act of friendship, when the rest of the ton were scandalised. This season, she delivers a sharp, quietly piercing monologue on respecting others’ dreams. There is a lineage at play here, too. Written within decades of each other – and within the same loose historical moment Bridgerton borrows from – characters like Margaret Dashwood in Sense and Sensibility and Amy and Meg March in Little Women come to mind: young women defined not only by romance, but by ambition, curiosity, and moral clarity.
It is Florence’s chemistry with her on-screen sister Eloise, however, that proves particularly electric. “This season, with the relationship between heand Eloise, we were able to find out more about Hyacinth and more about where she’s coming from in life,” Florence explains. “We’ve always had these snippets of her personality, but being able to put her against Eloise – who’s so totally different – you can gauge what kind of person she is.”
Such is the period-transcending quality of Florence’s performance that it’s hard to resist speculating about what Hyacinth might be like today. She’d live in Notting Hill, I suggest. Barbour sponsorship at Glastonbury. Florence laughs. “Yeah! She’d be completely on top of pop culture, for sure. Someone wrote on TikTok, ‘RIP Hyacinth, you would have loved academic validation.’ And I was like – that’s so true. She would have loved it. I feel like she would have gone to university and smoked all these men out of the park.”
“But yeah,” she adds, “I feel like we’re quite similar people in terms of loving fashion and all of that. I feel like she would have been similar. We would have been friends.”
Which brings me neatly to the next question. In a social media–led campaign culture, where behind-the-scenes footage is treated with the same reverence as official trailers, and Instagram dumps and TikToks function as a press tour in their own right, the close-knit dynamic of the Bridgerton cast has become as beloved as their on-screen relationships. Whether dancing to “Shake It Off” or posting unpolished moments between takes, these videos show seasoned actors and household names alike throwing themselves into skits and dances – often orbiting Florence’s unapologetic, Gen Z girlishness.
Considering she quite literally grew up on this set, I’m keen to hear how she experiences it. “Obviously the cast, but also the crew – there are so many people who were on Bridgerton in season one,” Florence says earnestly. “We’re all like, isn’t it crazy that we’re still doing this? That we still get to do all of this together. It really is just a room full of joy, full of people who genuinely love their job.”
“We genuinely do those family scenes in the drawing room, where everyone’s got one line,” she continues. “And we’re bouncing off each other. It’s literally like that in real life. We’re all very normal people – although it’s probably extraordinary to someone coming onto set for the first time. But if you’re there often enough, you realise how normal everyone is.” Florence mentions that she enjoys bringing family members onto set, “because I get to see it through their eyes.”
As anyone who follows Florence on Instagram or TikTok – where she occasionally uploads clips with her on-screen family – will already know, her Bridgerton sisters have become especially close. “Hannah [Dodd] and Claudia [Jessie], who play my sisters, are constantly messaging me and checking in on me,” she says warmly. “They’re just the sweetest girls ever. They literally are my sisters.”
We are living through a particularly visible moment for children in the limelight. Stranger Things, also distributed by Netflix, has just concluded its decade-long run, thrusting its now fully-fledged young adult cast into a graduation to the celebrity stratosphere. On a more sinister note, the space within the news cycle where celeb gossip merges with headline-dominating stories is routinely stocked with accounts of former child stars suffering from abuse and neglect.
It is therefore something of a relief to hear Florence speak candidly – and positively – about the structures surrounding her. “In this day and age, Netflix is so great. You’re so protected,” she says. “I have such an amazing team around me – my parents, my family. Everyone’s so supportive and helpful.”
“It’s something I try not to think about too much,” she adds, when it comes to navigating fame as she enters adulthood. “I started acting because I absolutely loved it, and then carried on because of that love. So the fact that I’ve managed to make – well, so far,” she corrects herself quickly, “– somewhat of a career out of it is absolutely mind-blowing to me.”
Many young actors are educated on set. This season introduces a new antagonist in Lady Araminta Gun, played by Katie Leung, who was around 17 when she portrayed Cho Chang in Harry Potter. Katie has spoken about spending long stretches being tutored on set, while still attending school between filming.
Florence’s own experience, by contrast, sounds strikingly down-to-earth – albeit with an extraordinary part-time job. “Growing up acting, but also going to a very normal school, was really imperative,” she explains. “It meant I could switch between absolutely crazy situations – like going to a Bridgerton premiere – and then straight back into normal life. I always had that juxtaposition.”
“I have my school friends, who are my closest friends,” she continues. “They don’t even watch the show. They’re like, ‘That’s brilliant, great.’” We both laugh. “I was at the pub with them last night,” she adds, grinning. “Talking about such normal things.”
There is something so distinctly British about your mate from school being in a huge Netflix series that you don’t watch, and going to the pub to yap about other things instead.
And there are other things to talk about. They’ve all recently finished their A-levels, Florence tells me. “That’s what it’s about, you know,” she laughs, after I mention an old interview in which actor Sophie Turner said much the same about Game of Thrones. “Getting bladdered at the pub and doing the serious stuff the next day.”
By serious stuff, we’re including recent projects beyond Bridgerton.
Last summer, Florence starred in Mix Tape, a romantic miniseries set in late ‘80s Sheffield, in which she plays a teenage girl falling in love. “It was so much fun,” she says with considerable zest. “I was playing a completely different character, with a different accent – I did accent training. It was really fun to switch into that.” The BBC-produced series, which also stars actors Teresa Palmer and Jim Sturgess, marked a tonal shift as well as a geographical one. Critics were quick to praise Florence’s performance, calling it “intoxicating” and “star-making.”
She also has her film debut, Queen at Sea, on the horizon – a project she shot three years ago on location in London, opposite Juliette Binoche, playing her daughter. The film premieres at the Berlin Film Festival this February. “I watched it for the first time recently,” Florence says. “Watching yourself is weird anyway, but watching yourself from three years ago is really strange. I knew it was going to be good, but I watched it and just thought – oh my gosh. It’s heartbreaking. It’s so powerful.”
As for attending the Berlin Film Festival, Florence once again pivots from thoughtful and conscientious actor to a regular young woman. “I mean, look at me,” says Florence, noticeably thrilled, laughing again. “I’m like, apparently Charli XCX is going to be there. No one is safe if I see Charli XCX.”
Halfway through our conversation, it strikes me that talking to Florence feels like catching up with your friend’s cool younger sister – thoughtful, funny, and refreshingly unguarded. She laughs about confusing tracks from BRAT (“365” and “360”; we agree we can only truly remember the difference by what musicians she has on the remix album.) “There’s a bit in the next Bridgerton drop where I dance to a Charli XCX song,” she tells me, laughing at my reaction. Good for Hyacinth, I say. “I know! This is how I know we’d be friends.”
For the scene, Florence got to choose the music herself. “I had that song on repeat for, like, a week,” she says. “You know when a song really takes you back to a time? That’s what I associate it with now.” You heard it here first: Hyacinth is a BRAT girl.
“I love music so much,” she continues. “When you get woken up at 4am to start filming, you have to have some sort of pick-me-up. Whether it’s coffee, music, or both, it’s imperative to start your day. I was listening to a lot of, you know, the normal. Billie Eilish, and everything.” Granted, as would any teenage girl on a Netflix show.
Like many young women of her generation, Florence is attuned to the broader cultural moment. Discussing the other major February release – Emerald Fennell’s Wuthering Heights — she lights up. “I saw the trailer and thought, this is why Emerald is a genius,” she says. “She’s not just remaking it – she’s making it something else. It’s so clever.” A dream collaborator, then? “Absolutely. Even just to meet her. I’m literally in love with that woman.”
Just days after her 19th birthday, Florence speaks about the future with a balance of ambition and perspective. “I like the stuff that’s being made at the moment,” she says. “The rise of A24 films, doing more films but balancing that with series work – it’s all really exciting.”
“I’m just excited for the future,” she states. “There are so many different genres I haven’t done, and directors I haven’t worked with. I’m excited to see what scripts will come through. People always ask me what my dream role is. I’m the kind of actor who’s just excited to see what is being made at the moment.”
At one point, Florence jokes about living a double life – between pub nights with school friends and red carpets, film festivals, and being Jonathan Anderson’s choice of Dior ambassador. It’s a sentiment she returns to near the end of our conversation.
“I don’t really have an end goal,” she says, smiling. “I’m just trying to do some acting here and there – and live a normal life.” A reminder that growing up doesn’t mean growing apart from the girl that made you a woman – sometimes it just means juggling it in a ballgown.
DIOR SS26: One for the history books.
For Spring/Summer 2026, Dior dares to place its history in a box – not to seal it away, but to return to it with freedom. Memories resurface as lines, fragments and silhouettes, reimagined through a language that is at once familiar and unexpected. Past and present converse in harmony and tension: the bold meets the calm, the grand collides with the everyday.
Fashion becomes a form of empathy; transforming the overload of modern life into poise, movement, and character. Dressing is theatre, and every woman steps onto the stage in her own way. This couture vision extends to beauty, where performance and emotion meet precision.
Diorshow Overvolume writes its next chapter in 2026 with a new waterproof, ultra-pigmented formula, housed in a silver cannage case. Lashes steal the show in striking new shades, joined by limited-edition Diorshow 5 Couleurs palettes that amplify the look. Embodied by Deva Cassel and Willow Smith, the gaze becomes magnetic, unapologetic and unforgettable.
Complexion is further perfected with Dior Forever, where the finish of a filter meets the care of a serum. Designed backstage and tested under the most demanding lights, Dior Forever Skin Glow and Dior Forever Skin Wear deliver 24-hour, no-retouch perfection – radiant or matte, weightless yet flawless, in every close-up moment. Together, they set the stage for a complete transformation. After all, who says you can’t reinvent history?
Pre-order Wonderland’s Spring 26 issue now here.
Photography by Eva Wang
Styling by Kamran Rajput
Words by Bea Isaacson
Hair by Patrick Wilson at The Wall Group
Make-up by Gina Kane at Caren Agency using Dior Beauty
Nails by Jessica Ciesco using Dior Beauty
Lighting Technician Jonny Greenwood
Fashion Assistant Jenny Li
Make-up Assistant Sally Bahri
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At 19, Florence Hunt is stepping into society, on screen and off. In Bridgerton, she’s Hyacinth, the youngest Bridgerton daughter biding her time as the belle of the ball. Off screen, she’s already the talk of the ton – and a Dior girl under Jonathan Anderson.
“It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife,” Jane Austen wrote. Two centuries on, another rule has quietly taken hold: that a young woman on the brink of stardom will, inevitably, be claimed by a major fashion house.
For actor Florence Hunt, warm and sharp-witted in equal measure, that rite of passage arrives in the form of a Dior ambassadorship, announced alongside the release of Bridgerton’s fourth season. Best known for playing Hyacinth Bridgerton – the youngest daughter of the show’s sprawling Regency clan – Florence was just 11 years old when she was cast in the series’ first outing.
Now 19, Florence is back on our screens – whether that screen is a television, a laptop, or, as I clocked on the Tube the other day, an iPhone – ushering her once-peripheral character further into the orbit of the ton. Hyacinth, no longer a child observer, is inching closer to society’s centre, impatiently awaiting her own moment to debut. This Dior role feels like a kind of coming-out of your own, I tell Florence over Zoom – albeit in a glossy, 21st-century It-girl sense.
“Yeah!” she laughs, delighted. “I love that.”
“It’s so exciting,” Florence continues, bubbly and vivacious, sitting in front of what looks like a wardrobe. “It’s absolutely wild. It’s just one of those things you never, ever consider would be an opportunity for you. And I’m so grateful to Jonathan and everyone at Dior who’s trusted me with this title.”
For it’s not just Bridgerton undergoing a new season. Having joined the fashion house last April, creative director Jonathan Anderson is still within his first year at the helm of Dior. “I’m obsessed with fashion – the whole fashion world,” Florence effuses. “I’m very grateful to be able to get a closer look at everything.”
With other young actors Sophie Wilde and Ever Anderson also announced, it’s not just a declaration of bright young thing status, but a clear vote of confidence in Florence as part of the next generation of women in film.
And yet Florence is not taking any of this for granted. “Dior, and then Bridgerton coming out,” she says, sounding slightly awed as she recites it back to me. “It’s all coming into fruition. All at the same time. I feel very grateful.”
It’s all happening at full speed. It is also somewhat entwined.
“You’re surrounded by the greatest, most talented dressmakers and designers,” Florence says of the iconic Bridgerton wardrobe, where Regency attire is lavishly romanticised for grand, maximalist effect. She tells me she recently brought her grandmother to “the warehouse where they make all of the Bridgerton costumes. It’s insane – the amount of work and dedication and love that goes into it.”
Hyacinth’s wardrobe in particular has been noticeably elevated this series, reflecting the character’s transition from child to someone with her own scenes and storyline. This isn’t subtle: the season opens with Hyacinth proudly declaring that Violet has given her blessing for her youngest daughter to lower her hemline – an era-appropriate marker of a girl becoming a woman. “It’s great to see Hyacinth growing up,” Florence continues. “The costumes and the hair and the make-up and everything changes as you grow up. It’s fun, isn’t it?”
As is the consistent charm of the show, Bridgerton grounds real emotional experience within a semi-historical framework. More confident and ambitious than its rom-com peers – and considerably more fun than many period dramas – this is a corsets-and-carriages universe where handsome men pine, strong-willed women win, and string quartets play Taylor Swift.
And, as I said, people are streaming it on the Tube. “I think what’s so great about the show is that every season, people relate to the character in the spotlight,” Florence says of its enduring popularity. “Everyone has their own favourite season, which is such a great part of the show. And that’s one of the geniuses of Shonda [Rhimes].”
Naturally, it’s not just the costumes – or even the characters – that bring audiences, nearly 40 million for the fourth season, back every few years. First released during lockdown, the Netflix series continues to be devoured for its escapist pull, a reminder of how deeply audiences still crave fantasy comfort viewing.
“The ball at the beginning was so much fun to film,” Florence continues, after I mention how much I enjoyed the post-debutante sequence. “I mean, I was there for maybe two days, but just being on set – seeing people in these crazy costumes – you’re like, how is this real life? There’s just the most creative people putting this enormous ball together. It was really, really special.”
Within the first episode alone, Hyacinth manages to sneak into the ton’s annual masked ball, the first clear signal of her expanded storyline this season: a bold child growing into a headstrong teenager. In a show that ricochets between plotlines – a Cinderella romance, Lady Danbury’s retirement, class consciousness via a housemaid shortage in Mayfair – Hyacinth’s scenes, now propelled forward as a primary narrative thread, bring an often-needed sense of youth and vitality. Florence plays her with both the fierceness of the confident youngest sister and the vulnerability of a girl yearning for her life to begin.
You cannot help but empathise with Hyacinth. It’s not simply a desire to grow up or join her older siblings, but something more acute and poignant: an awareness of where she would like to be, paired with the frustration of not yet being able to get there. Florence’s performance captures the desperation to belong, the thrum of anticipation, the impatience of adolescence – without tipping into self-pity. Hyacinth’s wit and self-possession, coupled with her unapologetic understanding of herself, neatly halt any slide into victimhood. Little wonder that, with only four of the eight episodes released as we speak in January, fans are already rushing to immortalise her across TikTok edits and stan videos.
How much does Florence relate to her character at this particular moment in Hyacinth’s arc, I ask. “I feel like I am on the same journey as any girl,” she says thoughtfully, pausing to consider her words. “Maturing and learning about the world. It’s exciting to see what they write for her – what Jess [Brownell] and all the writers do with Hyacinth – because I care about her so much.” She pauses again, then smiles. “And you naturally do, pretending to be this person for so long. You can’t help but care deeply – maybe too deeply – about that character.”
I joke that audiences have been breadcrumbed – to repurpose the Gen Z dating term – into rooting for Hyacinth since the very first season. Despite being a stickler for society rules – the girl cannot wait to come out – she has always been an independent thinker within the world she was raised in. She was the first to reassure her brother Colin that his plot-defining flirtation lessons with Penelope Featherington last season were, in fact, an admirable act of friendship, when the rest of the ton were scandalised. This season, she delivers a sharp, quietly piercing monologue on respecting others’ dreams. There is a lineage at play here, too. Written within decades of each other – and within the same loose historical moment Bridgerton borrows from – characters like Margaret Dashwood in Sense and Sensibility and Amy and Meg March in Little Women come to mind: young women defined not only by romance, but by ambition, curiosity, and moral clarity.
It is Florence’s chemistry with her on-screen sister Eloise, however, that proves particularly electric. “This season, with the relationship between heand Eloise, we were able to find out more about Hyacinth and more about where she’s coming from in life,” Florence explains. “We’ve always had these snippets of her personality, but being able to put her against Eloise – who’s so totally different – you can gauge what kind of person she is.”
Such is the period-transcending quality of Florence’s performance that it’s hard to resist speculating about what Hyacinth might be like today. She’d live in Notting Hill, I suggest. Barbour sponsorship at Glastonbury. Florence laughs. “Yeah! She’d be completely on top of pop culture, for sure. Someone wrote on TikTok, ‘RIP Hyacinth, you would have loved academic validation.’ And I was like – that’s so true. She would have loved it. I feel like she would have gone to university and smoked all these men out of the park.”
“But yeah,” she adds, “I feel like we’re quite similar people in terms of loving fashion and all of that. I feel like she would have been similar. We would have been friends.”
Which brings me neatly to the next question. In a social media–led campaign culture, where behind-the-scenes footage is treated with the same reverence as official trailers, and Instagram dumps and TikToks function as a press tour in their own right, the close-knit dynamic of the Bridgerton cast has become as beloved as their on-screen relationships. Whether dancing to “Shake It Off” or posting unpolished moments between takes, these videos show seasoned actors and household names alike throwing themselves into skits and dances – often orbiting Florence’s unapologetic, Gen Z girlishness.
Considering she quite literally grew up on this set, I’m keen to hear how she experiences it. “Obviously the cast, but also the crew – there are so many people who were on Bridgerton in season one,” Florence says earnestly. “We’re all like, isn’t it crazy that we’re still doing this? That we still get to do all of this together. It really is just a room full of joy, full of people who genuinely love their job.”
“We genuinely do those family scenes in the drawing room, where everyone’s got one line,” she continues. “And we’re bouncing off each other. It’s literally like that in real life. We’re all very normal people – although it’s probably extraordinary to someone coming onto set for the first time. But if you’re there often enough, you realise how normal everyone is.” Florence mentions that she enjoys bringing family members onto set, “because I get to see it through their eyes.”
As anyone who follows Florence on Instagram or TikTok – where she occasionally uploads clips with her on-screen family – will already know, her Bridgerton sisters have become especially close. “Hannah [Dodd] and Claudia [Jessie], who play my sisters, are constantly messaging me and checking in on me,” she says warmly. “They’re just the sweetest girls ever. They literally are my sisters.”
We are living through a particularly visible moment for children in the limelight. Stranger Things, also distributed by Netflix, has just concluded its decade-long run, thrusting its now fully-fledged young adult cast into a graduation to the celebrity stratosphere. On a more sinister note, the space within the news cycle where celeb gossip merges with headline-dominating stories is routinely stocked with accounts of former child stars suffering from abuse and neglect.
It is therefore something of a relief to hear Florence speak candidly – and positively – about the structures surrounding her. “In this day and age, Netflix is so great. You’re so protected,” she says. “I have such an amazing team around me – my parents, my family. Everyone’s so supportive and helpful.”
“It’s something I try not to think about too much,” she adds, when it comes to navigating fame as she enters adulthood. “I started acting because I absolutely loved it, and then carried on because of that love. So the fact that I’ve managed to make – well, so far,” she corrects herself quickly, “– somewhat of a career out of it is absolutely mind-blowing to me.”
Many young actors are educated on set. This season introduces a new antagonist in Lady Araminta Gun, played by Katie Leung, who was around 17 when she portrayed Cho Chang in Harry Potter. Katie has spoken about spending long stretches being tutored on set, while still attending school between filming.
Florence’s own experience, by contrast, sounds strikingly down-to-earth – albeit with an extraordinary part-time job. “Growing up acting, but also going to a very normal school, was really imperative,” she explains. “It meant I could switch between absolutely crazy situations – like going to a Bridgerton premiere – and then straight back into normal life. I always had that juxtaposition.”
“I have my school friends, who are my closest friends,” she continues. “They don’t even watch the show. They’re like, ‘That’s brilliant, great.’” We both laugh. “I was at the pub with them last night,” she adds, grinning. “Talking about such normal things.”
There is something so distinctly British about your mate from school being in a huge Netflix series that you don’t watch, and going to the pub to yap about other things instead.
And there are other things to talk about. They’ve all recently finished their A-levels, Florence tells me. “That’s what it’s about, you know,” she laughs, after I mention an old interview in which actor Sophie Turner said much the same about Game of Thrones. “Getting bladdered at the pub and doing the serious stuff the next day.”
By serious stuff, we’re including recent projects beyond Bridgerton.
Last summer, Florence starred in Mix Tape, a romantic miniseries set in late ‘80s Sheffield, in which she plays a teenage girl falling in love. “It was so much fun,” she says with considerable zest. “I was playing a completely different character, with a different accent – I did accent training. It was really fun to switch into that.” The BBC-produced series, which also stars actors Teresa Palmer and Jim Sturgess, marked a tonal shift as well as a geographical one. Critics were quick to praise Florence’s performance, calling it “intoxicating” and “star-making.”
She also has her film debut, Queen at Sea, on the horizon – a project she shot three years ago on location in London, opposite Juliette Binoche, playing her daughter. The film premieres at the Berlin Film Festival this February. “I watched it for the first time recently,” Florence says. “Watching yourself is weird anyway, but watching yourself from three years ago is really strange. I knew it was going to be good, but I watched it and just thought – oh my gosh. It’s heartbreaking. It’s so powerful.”
As for attending the Berlin Film Festival, Florence once again pivots from thoughtful and conscientious actor to a regular young woman. “I mean, look at me,” says Florence, noticeably thrilled, laughing again. “I’m like, apparently Charli XCX is going to be there. No one is safe if I see Charli XCX.”
Halfway through our conversation, it strikes me that talking to Florence feels like catching up with your friend’s cool younger sister – thoughtful, funny, and refreshingly unguarded. She laughs about confusing tracks from BRAT (“365” and “360”; we agree we can only truly remember the difference by what musicians she has on the remix album.) “There’s a bit in the next Bridgerton drop where I dance to a Charli XCX song,” she tells me, laughing at my reaction. Good for Hyacinth, I say. “I know! This is how I know we’d be friends.”
For the scene, Florence got to choose the music herself. “I had that song on repeat for, like, a week,” she says. “You know when a song really takes you back to a time? That’s what I associate it with now.” You heard it here first: Hyacinth is a BRAT girl.
“I love music so much,” she continues. “When you get woken up at 4am to start filming, you have to have some sort of pick-me-up. Whether it’s coffee, music, or both, it’s imperative to start your day. I was listening to a lot of, you know, the normal. Billie Eilish, and everything.” Granted, as would any teenage girl on a Netflix show.
Like many young women of her generation, Florence is attuned to the broader cultural moment. Discussing the other major February release – Emerald Fennell’s Wuthering Heights — she lights up. “I saw the trailer and thought, this is why Emerald is a genius,” she says. “She’s not just remaking it – she’s making it something else. It’s so clever.” A dream collaborator, then? “Absolutely. Even just to meet her. I’m literally in love with that woman.”
Just days after her 19th birthday, Florence speaks about the future with a balance of ambition and perspective. “I like the stuff that’s being made at the moment,” she says. “The rise of A24 films, doing more films but balancing that with series work – it’s all really exciting.”
“I’m just excited for the future,” she states. “There are so many different genres I haven’t done, and directors I haven’t worked with. I’m excited to see what scripts will come through. People always ask me what my dream role is. I’m the kind of actor who’s just excited to see what is being made at the moment.”
At one point, Florence jokes about living a double life – between pub nights with school friends and red carpets, film festivals, and being Jonathan Anderson’s choice of Dior ambassador. It’s a sentiment she returns to near the end of our conversation.
“I don’t really have an end goal,” she says, smiling. “I’m just trying to do some acting here and there – and live a normal life.” A reminder that growing up doesn’t mean growing apart from the girl that made you a woman – sometimes it just means juggling it in a ballgown.
DIOR SS26: One for the history books.
For Spring/Summer 2026, Dior dares to place its history in a box – not to seal it away, but to return to it with freedom. Memories resurface as lines, fragments and silhouettes, reimagined through a language that is at once familiar and unexpected. Past and present converse in harmony and tension: the bold meets the calm, the grand collides with the everyday.
Fashion becomes a form of empathy; transforming the overload of modern life into poise, movement, and character. Dressing is theatre, and every woman steps onto the stage in her own way. This couture vision extends to beauty, where performance and emotion meet precision.
Diorshow Overvolume writes its next chapter in 2026 with a new waterproof, ultra-pigmented formula, housed in a silver cannage case. Lashes steal the show in striking new shades, joined by limited-edition Diorshow 5 Couleurs palettes that amplify the look. Embodied by Deva Cassel and Willow Smith, the gaze becomes magnetic, unapologetic and unforgettable.
Complexion is further perfected with Dior Forever, where the finish of a filter meets the care of a serum. Designed backstage and tested under the most demanding lights, Dior Forever Skin Glow and Dior Forever Skin Wear deliver 24-hour, no-retouch perfection – radiant or matte, weightless yet flawless, in every close-up moment. Together, they set the stage for a complete transformation. After all, who says you can’t reinvent history?
Pre-order Wonderland’s Spring 26 issue now here.
Photography by Eva Wang
Styling by Kamran Rajput
Words by Bea Isaacson
Hair by Patrick Wilson at The Wall Group
Make-up by Gina Kane at Caren Agency using Dior Beauty
Nails by Jessica Ciesco using Dior Beauty
Lighting Technician Jonny Greenwood
Fashion Assistant Jenny Li
Make-up Assistant Sally Bahri
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