The VF Guide to Celebrity Brand Ambassadors: Who Who Gets Paid to Wear What—And Why it Matters

“Which brand do you think will sign Connor Storrie and Hudson Williams?” Has been the most popular question in my inbox, coming from high-powered executives, die-hard fashion fanatics, and casual readers alike. The mega-viral Heated Rivalry stars have taken our newsfeeds by storm, and it’s only natural that fashion will come for a hefty piece of this potentially very lucrative pie. This query, really, boils down to a simple question: Will Storrie and Williams sign on to become brand ambassadors? And if they do, what does that even mean?

In the days before the internet turned red carpets into something of a content circus, celebrities would just wear a thing. Think of, say, Julia Roberts attending the 1997 Golden Globe Awards in an Armani men’s suit she bought herself at a store.

If in the jetset disco era of Halston and his “Halstonettes”—which included Liza Minnelli, Elizabeth Taylor, and Bianca Jagger—the idea of a designer befriending a celebrity meant nothing other than them having a muse, a shift came in the ’90s, when designers like Tom Ford, Marc Jacobs, Gianni Versace and his sister Donatella started to become stars in their own right. Wearing a label then started to mean more: fame, access, clout.

Now those relationships have become more formal and corporate, with the added layer of becoming transactional. In most cases, these deals are negotiated by managers and lawyers and publicists, and outlined carefully in iron-clad contracts. Sure, celebrities can still be muses to designers, and often they still are, but they now also have a different label: “brand ambassador.”

Plainly, in the context of luxury fashion and celebrity today, a brand ambassador is someone who has been contracted to promote a label—be that by fronting campaigns, wearing its product, attending events like dinners, store openings, and fashion shows, or even partnering on a capsule or collection. The reason why this happens is straightforward enough: Celebrities, particularly today in the age of social media, can reach audiences in more organic ways than the companies can themselves. A picture is worth a thousand words, particularly when it comes with a fashion credit in a photo caption or a quick Instagram tag.

In the mid-2010s, with the rise of Instagram, kind of online exposure began to be measured and quantified, too. The fashion industry has started to calculate EMV, or earned media value, to represent the monetary value of media exposure which has not been paid for—like organic social posts, influencer and celebrity mentions, press coverage, and more. Simply, by measuring impressions and engagement, EMV estimates what a brand would have paid for equivalent advertising.

To go back to Storrie and Williams, their appearances at talk shows, junkets, or at the 2026 Golden Globes (where they wore Saint Laurent and Giorgio Armani, respectively) has a certain value to brands. The AI-powered data software Launchmetrics, which collates data around the fashion industry, has its own metric called Media Impact Value (MIV), which assigns monetary value to marketing strategies in order to calculate an estimated return on investment. An example, Louis Vuitton ambassador Zendaya fronted a campaign for the brand’s latest collaboration with the Japanese artist Takashi Murakami in December 2024. Launchmetrics calculated that its MIV a week after its release had been $7.4 million.

Celebrities have a lot to gain from these partnerships, too. And while numbers are rarely (if ever) disclosed, these are very lucrative contracts. Emma Stone’s now longtime contract with Vuitton had been initially reported to land between $6 and $10 million for two years when she first signed with the brand in 2017. Stone is a shining example of a longtime brand ambassador whose role has evolved over time: She started by fronting campaigns, but has since won an Oscars in Vuitton, filmed and recorded a podcast with its designer Nicolas Ghesquière, and covered the September 2025 issue of Vogue in six looks designed for her by the the designer in a story that documented their “real-life friendship.”

This is also why you very rarely see Stone wearing anything other than Vuitton on the red carpet, unless it’s a more minor event like last year’s Independent Film Spirit Awards for which she wore an Emilia Wickstead look. The more major the red carpet or event—Golden Globes, Oscars, etc.—the more likely you will see an ambassador wearing the label they represent. Most contracts include a certain number of events they need to wear the brand to, or specific ones, like Oscars.

Over the past decade, these partnerships have evolved past simply wearing the thing. Chanel often “supports” the films their ambassadors create, be that by providing funding, costumes, or more. Sofia Coppola’s Priscila was “supported” by Chanel: “loyal friend of the House Sofia Coppola asked Chanel to create the wedding dress in the scene of her [Priscilla Presley’s] wedding, reinterpreting the one Priscilla actually wore on her wedding day,” according to the brand’s website. Chanel figured in the theatrical release poster of Kristen Stweart’s Spencer, in which the actor carried a Chanel handbag in her first scene as Princess Diana.

In 2023, Saint Laurent launched Saint Laurent Productions. One of its first projects was Pedro Almódovar’s Strange Way of Life, which featured costumes by Anthony Vaccarello. Emilia Perez was also produced by the house. While its stars Zoe Saldaña and Karla Sofía Gascón are not official Saint Laurent ambassadors, they wore the label repeatedly throughout the press tour. The former won an Oscar for her role in 2025 in a dress by Vaccarello, exemplifying how brands have expanded its relationship with film past ambassadorial roles.

While some of these deals are strictly transactional, there are times in which they stem from personal relationships with designers. Armani, be that the Giorgio Armani label or Armani Privé, its couture line, doesn’t work with contracted ambassadors, but based on longstanding relationships the house has built with celebrities like Richard Gere or Cate Blanchett, via its late founder. In this case, these relationships would be closer to that of a “friend of the house,” which does not mean they’re not monetary or transactional, they’re just more ambiguously so. or. Think also of Dior’s new designer Jonathan Anderson, who has a reputation for aligning himself and his work with the most promising emerging talent. While working at Loewe, he signed on Greta Lee during her breakout year with Past Lives to front some of his campaigns. She has now followed him to Dior.

Other relationships transcend designers: Robert Pattinson and Jennifer Lawrence have been a part of the Dior fold for many years—the former’s relationship with the brand is now with its third designer, having started with Raf Simons, lasted through Maria Grazia Chiuri’s tenure, and now continuing under Anderson.

As there are brands who don’t work with ambassadors, say Hermès, there are also celebrities who famously won’t do fashion partnerships, even if they’ve fronted campaigns in the past. Angelina Jolie signed on to become a Tom Ford Beauty ambassador in 2024, but she has not been a formal brand ambassador at a fashion label. (The fashion arm of Tom Ford does not currently work with official ambassadors.) Ryan Gosling is an ambassador for Tag Heuer watches, and has fronted a Gucci campaign in the past, but unlike some of his counterparts he’s not been a brand ambassador for a label.

There are varying levels of transparency in the industry, with some brands promoting new ambassadors with great fanfare—like when Chanel announced A$AP Rocky with a video co-starring Margaret Qualley—and others keeping the whole thing under wraps. With awards season in full swing now, we reached out to over two dozen labels to track which stars are working with which brands.You will find some key players in the fashion luxury space missing, because they’ve declined to participate in this story or because they don’t work with ambassadors altogether, like the aforementioned Hermès, plus McQueen, Chloé, or Alaïa, or because they have a new creative director—like, say, Balenciaga with Pierpaolo Piccioli—and those conversations are a work in progress.

Our guide also includes jewelry and watch houses like Cartier, Rolex, Tiffany & Co., or Bvlgari as more and more of these companies are working with brand ambassadors, too, with jewelry becoming another opportunity in this space for actors to make money outside of film. Storrie was wearing Saint Laurent clothing and Tiffany & Co. jewelry, though only the jeweler got a shoutout on social media. Williams wore a Giorgio Armani suit, though he posted about his Bvlgari necklace as a “Bvlgari partner.” That’s the new showbiz, baby!

Fashion

Julianne Moore, Jacob Elordi, Vicky Krieps, Lorenzo Musetti, Shu Qi, IN, Guo, Jingjing, Tha Naerng, Pan Zhanle, and Guo Jing.

Jack Draper, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, Kim Seung-min from Stray Kids, Bright, Chen Kun, Tang Wei, Wu Lei, Zhang Jingyi, Asami Mizukawa, and Son Suk-ku.

V from BTS, Suzy Bae, and Shishi Liu.

A$AP Rocky, Nicole Kidman, Ayo Edebiri, Margaret Qualley, Margot Robbie, Gracie Abrams, Penélope Cruz, Whitney Peak, Lupita Nyong’o, Jennie, Kristen Stewart, Tilda Swinton, Marion Cotillard, Lily-Rose Depp, Sofia Coppola, Kendrick Lamar, Zhou Xun, Wang Yibo, G-Dragon, Timothée Chalamet, Angèle, Nana Komatsu, Leah Dou, and more.

Omar Apollo, Elle Fanning, Storm Reid, Jayson Tatum, Charles Melton, Soyeon, and Lilas Ikuta.

Jisoo, Anya Taylor-Joy, Charlize Theron, Nadia Tereszkiewicz, Deva Cassel, Jennifer Lawrence, Razane Jammal, Laetitia Casta, Liu Yuxin, Zhou Ye, Dilraba Dilmurat, Yuko Araki, Yuna Kim, Kimberley Anne Woltemas, Han So-hee, Miki Nakatani, Mikey Madison, Monica Barbaro, Mia Goth, Elke Biesendorfer, Greta Lee, 070 Shake, Nadia Melliti, Zheng Qinwen, Camille Cottin, Beatrice Borromeo, Nine d’Urso, Isabelle Adjani, Pretty Yende, Rikako Yagi, Tontawan Tantivejakul, Ling Ling Kwong, and Ora Yang.

Robert Pattinson, Kylian Mbappé, Louis Garrel, Lang Lang, Jimin, LaKeith Stanfield, Paul Kircher, Nam Joo-hyuk, James, Apo, Mile, Edgar Cheung, Quim Gutiérrez, Henry Lau, Deng Wei, Yu Shi, Li, Yunrui, Ryusei Yokohama, Takumi Kitamura, Bassel Khaiat, and Ahmed Malek.

Demi Moore and Paul Mescal.

Jeremy Strong.

Zendaya, Jeremy Allen White, Emma Stone, Chase Infiniti, Ana de Armas, Jennifer Connelly, and Chloë Grace Moretz.

Colman Domingo, Dakota Johnson, Lim Yoona, Jeff Satur, Freen Sarocha, Clairo, Jolin Tsai, Yang Zi, and Sun Li.

Jewelry and Watches

Serena Williams, Aryna Sabalenka, Mark Ronson, and Raye.

Colman Domingo is a friend of the maison. Daisy Edgar-Jones and Charlotte Le Bon are brand ambassadors.

Anne Hathaway and Priyanka Chopra.

Amal Clooney, Anna Sawai, Deepika Padukone, Elle Fanning, Emma Corrin, Gemma Chan, Jackson Wang, Jacob Elordi, Jisoo, Lily Collins, Monica Bellucci, Olivia Dean, Paul Mescal, Rami Malek, Sofia Coppola, V, Vanessa Kirby, and Zoë Saldaña.

Chase Infiniti is a friend of the house. Adwoa Aboah, Tang Wei, and Tan Jianci are brand ambassadors.

Jennifer Lawrence, Henry Cavill, Yosh Yu, Kate Winslet, Zhao Liying, Suzy, Barbara Palvin, Jung, Woo-sung, and Eddie Peng.

George Clooney, Cindy Crawford, Daniel Craig, Naomie Harris, Nicole Kidman, Kaia Gerber, Eddie Redmayne, Aaron Taylor Johnson, and Glen Powell are brand ambassadors. Colman Domingo, Ariana DeBose, Antoni Porowski, and Jonathan Bailey are friends of the house.

Ariana Grande.

Adria Arjona, Alison Oliver, Anya Taylor-Joy, Camille Cottin, Chase Sui Wonders, Dwyane Wade, Gabrielle Union, Greta Lee, Mikey Madison, Rosé, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, and Zhang Ziyi.

Zendaya, Leonardo DiCaprio, Martin Scorsese, and James Cameron.