Succession uses Shiv Roy’s hair and clothes to tell the story of her quest for power

TV viewers who are missing Cersei and Sansa and seeking to watch interesting women grapple with power struggles and ridiculous family dynamics — while also having great hair and an enviable wardrobe — need to look no further than Succession’s Siobhan Roy. Shiv, as she is known to family and friends, is the youngest Roy child and the only daughter in the dynastic media family. She’s emerged this season as both a favorite of her father and fans alike.

Succession, now in its second season, tells the story of an ultra-wealthy family whose patriarch, Logan Roy, is the head of a large media conglomerate. In the first season, two of Logan’s sons jockey for position in the hierarchy, hoping to be the next to lead the family empire. Shiv (played by Sarah Snook), meanwhile, has been working for the campaign of a liberal politician, thumbing her nose at the family business. Then at the beginning of season two, Logan tells Shiv that she is his choice to take over the empire, after an appropriate time period for grooming via management training and visits to the office.

And groom she did, at least outwardly. The change in her hair and wardrobe is significant between seasons one and two. Her previously long, flowy hair became an angular bob. She traded slouchy, almost sloppy, sweaters and pants in soft colors for a simple yet luxurious wardrobe of crisp monochromatic trousers paired with turtlenecks or button-downs. Shiv’s look was carefully calculated to reflect both her environment and her ambitions.

“She doesn’t want to be identified, especially in season one, as one of the family. She wants to be an individual,” says Michelle Matland, who has been the show’s costume designer since early in the first season. In season two, that desire changes as she shifts her priorities. “She wants to be identified as a power in the room.”

Vox got some intel from Matland, the show’s season two hair department head Jasen Sica, and an image consultant to explain just why and how Shiv’s new look is so potent.

In the pilot, Shiv wears a huge, shapeless Fair Isle sweater, paired with rolled-up maroon trousers, what look like hiking boots, a rust-colored trench, and a blue baseball cap. The sweater came from H&M’s L.O.G.G. brand, a surprising place for a billionaire to shop. (Let’s assume the team didn’t have much money to shoot the pilot.)

Her work wardrobe, which she wears as a political consultant, is slightly more polished, with paisley scarves thrown in and her hair worn loose and wavy. Her preference for autumnal and jewel-toned colors is consistent throughout the first season. The whole effect is one of softness.

It’s not particularly expensive, either, at least by the standards of the ultra-wealthy. Matland says a lot of pieces in Shiv’s first season wardrobe came from the workwear staple Theory. (Theory is a contemporary brand known for its professional-lady clothes. A suit can cost more than $800, but it’s a price point or two below high-end designer clothes.)

“That was more the identity of a working woman out in the workplace. Prior to her transformation, she had her own life and was basically trying to distinguish herself as someone on her own,” Matland says. “She wants to be identified as a real person.” Nothing is realer than picking through racks of practical trousers at Theory, apparently.

That isn’t to say Shiv dressed inexpensively or is always understated. Her wedding to Tom, the Roy employee who is obsessed with the family’s wealth and power and marries way up, showcases how rich the family truly is. The wedding is held at her mother’s estate in England, and some of her choices reflect this side of her heritage. Shiv tends to keep her everyday jewelry small and understated yet still pricey. (Matland says she has purchased some of it at boutiques in small villages in Pennsylvania.) For the pre-wedding party, though, Shiv wears some huge jeweled earrings that Princess Diana likely would have appreciated.

“She is with her mother, who is very regal. She’s an aristocrat, so there’s heightened jewelry. That is a choice. The backstory is that maybe her mother gave them to her five Christmases ago. It was intentional for her to have a moment of glam,” says Matland.

Then came the first episode of season two, featuring Shiv and Tom on their honeymoon on a yacht, where she first debuted that hair. Emily VanDerWerff, Vox’s critic at large, called it a “power cut,” and that’s exactly what it is.

“Shiv’s hair needed to be stronger-looking this year. She has stepped up her image. The change is significant,” Jasen Sica, the show’s hair department head, wrote in an email. He cut 8 inches off Snook’s hair. (Sica did not elaborate on the styling process, but it’s an impeccable blowout on top of a technical cut. You can imagine her having someone come to her apartment to do it for her every morning.)

In season one, Shiv’s hair is long and sometimes messy. When she’s at fancy parties, it has an almost vintage ’40s vibe. It was another contributor to her “soft” look, according to Matland.

In the world of the show, the dramatic cut happened before Logan offered Shiv a shot at running the business, but let’s just assume she had a premonition that it was going to happen and it’s not a continuity issue. As her political ambitions and her disgraced, heir-to-the-throne brother Kendall both faltered, maybe her ambitions in the family business grew? Or perhaps Logan was so subconsciously influenced by this powerful hair that tapping Shiv as his successor was the obvious outcome. After all, anyone who can maintain that level of precision and smoothness can surely run a company.

But what exactly is it about a sleek bob that exudes power? “Angles in general are perceived as more powerful and visually commanding than curves and waves,” says Carol Davidson, an image consultant based in New York City who watches the show. “She embodies executive presence.” (It’s telling that in America, executive presence is still associated with straight hair, a perception that black women and others with naturally curly hair have had to fight for decades.)

One brief real-world aside about this hair: Last year, New Yorker critic Emily Nussbaum described Shiv’s character as “a canny mashup of Ivanka Trump and the fiery-haired Murdoch lieutenant Rebekah Brooks.” Ivanka showed up in Colombia over the weekend with the exact same shorter blunt bob that Shiv now has. The Daily Beast compared it to Shiv’s. A hairstylist named Devin Toth told the outlet, “I think that anytime someone does this chop, it gives off a ‘take me more seriously’ vibe. You appear more intentional, precise, and discerning. Just think of Anna Wintour.”

Shiv’s wardrobe change in the second season has also been purposeful. Gone are the soft colors. In their place are lots of neutrals like gray and black and a series of high-waisted trousers that would make Marlene Dietrich weep.

In fact, Dietrich was a major influence for Shiv’s season two looks, says Matland. The costume designer had also done a lot of historical research into women wearing pantsuits and was particularly taken by the fact that in the 1930s women could actually be arrested for wearing them and “impersonating men.” But it’s not about being mannish.

“She wants to be the woman that she is, but I think she knows she is competing in a man’s world,” says Matland, describing Shiv’s newer clothes as “potent, sharp, and sophisticated … she wants to dress so that she is feminine but also has a sense of masculinity in her style.”

The form-fitting turtlenecks show off her figure but are structured and keep her covered. Not to wallow in Game of Thrones nostalgia here, but it harks back to Sansa Stark’s symbolic leather armor, a metaphor that Matland confirms. “She wants to make sure she is an equal. It gives her the armor to not look like a soft kitten in the room.”

While the look is classic, Shiv’s also a lot more fashionable this season, per Matland, wearing high-waisted pants and sharper shoulders. Her clothes are meant to look like they’re from some of the most expensive and tasteful luxury brands out there: MaxMara, Armani, Ralph Lauren, and the Olsen twins’ label the Row, where a pair of trousers can cost nearly $1,300. Some of them actually are from these designers, but one particularly good pair is a slightly more palatable $299 from SuiStudio.

The overall effect seems to be working, according to Davidson, the image consultant. She says shirts with collars and turtlenecks pack more of a visual impact than crewnecks.

“At that level, you do want to be sporting some power markers like clean lines and solid colors,” she says. “[Shiv’s] the personification of power and success, and she’s looking every bit the visual equal to any of her male counterparts.”

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