Sienna Miller is gazing wistfully back at me from a meadow. Her honey-blonde hair is softly tousled, her skin is sun-dappled, and she's wearing a pink boudoir-coded bodice with one chiffon sleeve tumbling seductively off her shoulder as she sits among wild flowers. It's Virgin Suicides meets ‘70s beauty ad, and it’s so Sienna Miller – except it isn't, because a few minutes later the real Sienna takes her seat on the Zoom call, wearing a utilitarian white shirt.
Glancing over her shoulder at her campaign shot for Charlotte Tilbury's Pillow Talk in Bloom, she grins and says, “Stick me in a garden with some wildflowers, and it feels like my natural habitat. They wanted to do something that was a little bit more romantic [for this campaign]. There's such a Hollywood glamour associated with the brand, but this was all in an English country garden. It was a bit more nature, which I feel suits me quite well. The romance in a more organic rural setting is probably more aligned with who I actually am as a person, so it was a good moment for us to start working together.”
Sienna is the new face of Charlotte Tilbury's limited-edition Blush Balm Lip Tint – a 3-in-1 lipstick, balm and tint that works with your skin's pH to create a sheer shade unique to you. It launches today and, as one of the first beauty journalists to try it, I can confirm that it does indeed give you the same just-kissed flush as a love-struck teenager.
The boho vibe of the campaign is unmistakable and an interesting 360° for Sienna. In the early Noughties, she was the pin-up for festival-adjacent dresses and circle belts, but, after an intense period of press intrusion, ‘boho chic’ became a label she rallied against. “I'm fine with it now," she says. “I think it's really funny – boho chic feels like it just was here for me, but I'm in total denial about how fast time is passing. It's funny seeing my 13-year-old [Marlowe, her daughter with ex-boyfriend Tom Sturridge] suddenly in Moroccan belts. I think I reacted to being put in a box with those labels at that time, when I just felt like I had no control over any of my identity. Any kind of labelling, I had a reaction to.”
In our Glamour interview, Sienna isn't evasive about her past. But perhaps being at the heart of today's more grown-up boho revival is a kind of proof that she's now at peace with it – whether it's being decked out from head to toe in Chloé or wafting around in Charlotte's rolling meadow.
Here, the actress talks about why she's calmer in her 40s, the speedy makeup hacks she swears by, modern motherhood and ageing on her terms.
I've always used lipstick on my eyelids and my cheeks, too.
Whatever lipstick I have on, I'll match it to the bridge of my nose, cheeks and eyes to pull the whole look together. I'll be honest, the tint of the Blush Balm Lip Tint is ideal because you can use it in three different areas, and it's skincare as well as makeup. And that just suits me. I don't want to be lugging around a million different things. So that will definitely be in my makeup bag, alongside a Charlotte Tilbury Foxy Brown Lip Cheat, a lip liner that I use for freckles. Jaw line freckles really make me look better because my natural freckles are slightly blended into one large pigment situation.
It was the '90s when I was at school. It was a win if I washed my face.
It's very different these days to what it was then. No sunscreen, fags. It was a different world then. I have to say, it was more fun. But nowadays I'm a grown-up, and I wash my face every night, even if I'm exhausted. I'm quite intuitive when it comes to skin, so I know what I need. I look after my skin much more than I used to. Lots of vitamin C and Magic Cream, I think is amazing. I've used that since before it was called Magic Cream and Charlotte used to blend her own creams. The OG! I think my skin's better now than it was then. Obviously, it's older, slightly falling down, but its actual texture is better than it was when I was younger.
I'm quite slutty, as in I'm not that loyal. I'm a bit of a hussy when it comes to beauty products.
At the moment, I've got a SkinCeuticals face wash and an Obaji face wash. I like a gel cleanser even though it's probably not as good for you as a cream one, but it just takes everything off when I'm filming. I've got my micellar water by Keren Bartov that I will use in the morning and that I really like. Shane Cooper's got this mask, where it foams up and you look like funny. That's a good one. That's by the bath if I need a little bit of a refresh. I got sent some SkinCeuticals P-Tiox serum. I'm a slut so I'm using that as it's the new shiny thing in the cupboard. What else? I'm going through my cupboard…Sarah Chapman – I love her products.
That filtered look with the lips? Everybody looks like the same person – and that to me isn't beautiful.
People are celebrating beauty in its different forms. I'm relieved to say that people are pairing back on that aesthetic. I see a shift, and I see it actually in my daughter's generation. The girls that she's friends with went through a whole phase of full-face makeup, and they're kind of stripping it back. I think the world is in such chaos that it's nice just to have some authenticity. I mean, there are a million beautiful people, but if you are not working on the inside, it doesn't matter. A face is a face – they're everywhere. It's irrelevant, I think. We're all craving a little bit more depth, which I see reflected in fashion and beauty, and that's nice.
For me, your forties is the perfect time to be having babies.
I was pregnant with Marlowe at 29. It's so different having a baby in your forties. It really suits me because I want to be in bed by 9 o'clock. I'm really lucky. I can work intensely and then take some intense time off. I just feel very, very blessed. I always dreamt of having three kids, and I can't quite believe that. I never thought it would happen. And I'm very, very happy. We [Sienna and her partner Oli Green] thought, let's just try and see. And then I got pregnant straight away. So I've been really fortunate to be able to continue popping out kids. I wonder when it's gonna end? I think this is it.
I think you've gone through a lot of the neurosis that you go through, and after the biological clock of your 30s, which was really loud and really intense for me, I was just kind of like whatever. And then of course, here I am about to have my third child.
It really suits me. I have loads of energy. I don't feel depleted by it. I feel much more grounded and that my life is in a much more stable place. And it's something that we never question with men. I've been really fortunate that's something my body's naturally been able to do. But I think in whatever form motherhood takes, you know, we just have to stop judging people. I'm doing it my way and I'm loving it.
If I have 15 minutes to get ready for a fabulous party…
Hair, I just leave pretty much as it is because it's naturally got a wave that people have said is nice. Maybe I'll add a bit of Sam McKnight's Cool Girl Spray as it's a reviver. There's also Larry King's styling cream if it's all fluffy and weird.
I'm doing the Unreal Skin foundation stick – every time I use it, people comment on my skin and I know it's just that because, when I don't use it, I don't get the comments. I'm actually talking about things that I'm not doing the campaign for, that's how you know it's authentic. I'm doing some concealer around my nose and on my chin to take away the redness.
A few freckles, a bit of bronzer. I've got a really weird, quite deathly-coloured Fenty bronzer. It would not be a palette you'd be drawn to, but for me, it works quite well. Or Charlotte's Airbrush Flawless Bronzer that I'll just dip into and you can literally just go for. I also like the Tan-Luxe self-tan drops - they're great. And then, if it's a bit more glamorous, maybe I'll do a red lip with a slightly darker red lip liner, and then very little else.
I know who I am, and I know the way that I want to age. And that's with minimally invasive treatments.
I think it's really important to have those conversations [about ageing]. I want to be able to have motion in my face when I age. I love seeing actresses on film who have that ability to move. It can, at a certain point, look like your insecurities are just being televised versus you look younger. I think it's kind of counterintuitive. I've just been filming with Celia Imrie who's in her seventies and she's not touched her face and it's so beautiful. Or Charlotte Rampling in Dune.
That being said, you have your face scrutinised. It's really difficult. I do think that actresses are lucky because I get given free treatments like laser and Morpheus. I've got a Lyma Laser that I was given. I think if you can do that stuff religiously, you can avoid the other stuff. Now watch me go off for a facelift in 10 years' time!
I'm pregnant, so I can't do anything. I'm really excited about something when I have the baby. But I think if you can avoid it and like, no filler. Ever. It looks bad. I don't want to look like everybody else. I think you do end up looking like whoever your doctor also sees.
There are ways of doing really micro little things, which look great, but I don't want a frozen face. And the kind of directors I want to work with would not hire me to do the work if I had that done. So you've gotta just dig deep and get through it and, in a culture where we're so forced to focus on ourselves endlessly, just like flip the lens and look out. It's better for all of our mental health as well as physical health.
I don't even know what the biggest misconception would be because I really don't care anymore what people think.
I could have answered that question [about people's biggest misconceptions] for hours in my twenties because there were several. I just think it's their business, what they think. It doesn't really have any impact. I'm pretty confident in who I am and the people that I have around me and the choices that I've made. I don't give a shit.
Culture shifted away from the power being in the hands of a group of men who would chase you, and very much into people's own hands.
It's really boring, but I look after my mental health with enough sleep. I just think my life is just easier now. It's much quieter…I just don't really pay attention to much exterior noise, which I think can drive you a little bit nuts. My life is very busy and very inspiring with work and very cozy with home. It's quite a nice balance I've got going.
I know that if I'm not feeling empowered, it'll probably correlate to not having had enough sleep.
I feel most empowered when I'm rested. When I'm out, I feel really empowered. If I'm with my friends running around, having a really fun day, that's empowering. I think being pregnant is quite an empowering state of mind. And then having a great day at work. You know, creative fulfilment. There's lots of different versions of empowerment. I definitely don't feel empowered today because I didn't sleep enough.
I'm not really into that much wellness. I love the idea of wellness, it's just that it takes planning and I'm not organised enough. You know, I'm sort of patting myself on the back if I have a bircher muesli and blueberries versus Marmite on toast. It's like, that's as far as it's gonna go!
