COVER STORY

Bibbs and Bobs

After almost three decades in Holly wood, Leslie Bibb is finally receiving the recognition she has long deserved

STYLING JULIANNA ALABADO WORDS KATE LANCASTER

PHOTOGRAPHY TERENCE CONNORS

Opposite Leslie Bibb wears Comme des Garçons shirt, POA; Van Cleef & Arpels earrings, $22,900, and rings (from top), $22,900 and $15,500.

Loewe dress, POA; Gucci shoes, $1550; Van Cleef & Arpels necklace, $41,800.

Louis Vuitton vest, $2160, and shorts POA; Van Cleef & Arpels rings (from left), $22,900 and $15,500, and bracelet $30,500.

You would never guess that Leslie Bibb is exhausted. Looking fresh-faced, open and relaxed in the fading light of late afternoon Los Angeles, the Palm Royale star flashes a cheerful smile as she settles in for our chat. It’s the day after the Emmys and the 51-year-old is apologetic as she addresses a sudden flood of notifications on her phone. It’s the first time she’s used the device since attending the awards, so her messages are now coming through on a delay.

Bibb briefly pauses her dismissal of the alerts to laugh at a message from her best friend and co-star in season three of The White Lotus, Aimee Lou Wood, who’s pinged her with a joke. “We were laughing about how everybody thinks the Emmys look so fancy,” Bibb explains. “But there I was in couture and the [red] carpet was soggy so my dress was getting wet. We were just cracking up at the reality versus the perception that people have.”

I had watched it all unfold from my desk in Sydney just hours earlier, as Bibb posed for photos alongside longtime partner Sam Rockwell. Her statuesque figure was clad in a strapless black velvet gown from Giorgio Armani’s final collection. The designer’s passing less than two weeks prior turned Bibb’s tailored ensemble into an unexpected homage to Armani’s sartorial legacy – “an honour” that Bibb says was well worth dodging a few puddles for. “Nobody tailored like that man did,” she adds.

During the awards ceremony, Bibb traded compliments with Kristen Bell, who also wore Armani Privé. While neither The White Lotus nor Bell’s Netflix comedy Nobody Wants This walked away with a win on the night, the pair giggled about the budding bromance between Rockwell and Bell’s husband, Dax Shepard. “Kristen joked that our partners must be in love with each other because they go to the gym together,” Bibb recalls with a laugh. “I replied, ‘Aren’t we lucky?’”