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WHO, WHAT® AND Who are Hollywood’s most elite fashionistas? The celebrity stylists. They rule Tinseltown and what you buy at Target. By Michele Meyer Rachel Zoe. No one you know? Well, she’s the one responsible for those Grecian god dess dresses and oversized sunglasses and handbags you have in your closet As a celebrity' stylist behind the seams, Zoe sets the tone for what Keira Knightley and Lindsay Lohan wear. In doing so, she and other styl ists have morphed from dressers-and-schleppers hired by magazines to press and pin clothes at photo shoots to star-shapers and fashion visionaries who are courted by designers, celebrities and clothing brands. Such pros snatch the “It” bag, shoe or jeans for their clients before collections hit the runways. They work a season ahead of stores and may pull looks before they are even sewn, making their A-lister a trendsetter. Designers oblige. After all, it’s free publicity. “If a pic ture is worth a thousand words, a celebrity carrying or wearing an item is worth a million words,” says Marshal Cohen, author of Why Customers Do What They Do. There are also more opportunities for star style to be seen. FVom Vogue and In Style to newcomers Life & Style and People Style Watch, more magazines run pics of stars a. 6 USA WEEKEND • Oct 5-7,2007 on endless red car pets, pumping gas and buying gro ceries than ever before. And every one from E! to TV Guide airs style focused awards show coverage, as well as critiques. Celeb stylist Robert Verdi advises client Eva Longoria at a fashion show. ASKING “WHO ARE YOU WEARING?” CHANGED THINGS Such fashion exposure has upped the ante. Hollywood icons used to attend the Oscars wearing dresses / by their favorite designers —or I bought off store racks and no one ever asked, “Who are you ft wearing?” The days of going it ft alone ended after Demi Moore V was snapped in a disastrous self designed bike shorts-and-bustier combo at the Academy Awards in I 1989. Now, as Italian designer k Giorgio Armani rued to the Wall J Street Journal, “No actress moves without her stylist.” “We’ve entered a topsy-turvy world where the stylist has more J power than the designer,” says Cohen, who’s also chief industry M analyst at the NPD Group, which I follows the fashion trade. “Styl ists are the matchmakers be tween designers and stars. And M celebrities have become the ve hicle ft u- designers to communi cate and separate themselves from the field.” Like puppetmasters, styl ists pull designers’ strings, says Tom Julian, longtime fashion ana- I lystforOscar.com, the official web- J site of the Academy Awards. “I flj have heard tales that a stylist be lieves that this gown must be in this color so it is,” he says. Why do creators obey? “What personal On the cover: Knightley: Dan Mac Medan, USA TODAY; Berry: Steve Granitz, Wirelmage; Longoria and Blanchett: Gilbert Flores, Celebrityphoto Iff C*\ "\ mUSW After Cameron Diaz wore this Le Doux bikini, the brand hit | | the fashion map.