For years, Emma Ferrer wasn’t on social media. The granddaughter of Audrey Hepburn had never tweeted or posted a duck-faced selfie to Instagram — an anomaly for a 20-something celebuspawn.
“It felt totally inauthentic to post shots of me in a bikini or selfies, just because I’m really not overly concerned with letting my appearance define me in general,” Ferrer, 23, tells The Post.
But in early 2017, Ferrer, who has dabbled in modeling since 2014, finally took the plunge and joined Instagram, where she shares tasteful modeling snaps and pictures of her artwork.
“Actually, embracing social media had a lot to do with figuring out my identity,” she says.
Ferrer has always lived her life away from the Tinseltown madness. The daughter of Hepburn’s son, Sean Ferrer, she was born in Switzerland in 1994, a year after her grandmother passed away. She grew up in relative anonymity in Los Angeles and Italy, where she studied art and learned to speak Italian, French and Spanish. (Her mother, Leila Flannigan, is divorced from Ferrer.)
Few people even knew Hepburn had a beautiful granddaughter who had inherited her full lips, patrician profile and grace.
That all changed in 2014 when Harper’s Bazaar editrix Glenda Bailey discovered Ferrer through a colleague and put her on the cover of her magazine’s prestigious September issue — sending the fashion world into a tizzy.
She made the rounds at New York and Paris Fashion Weeks and was signed by buzzy agency Storm Model Management.
But then Ferrer simply disappeared from the scene.
The beauty says she needed to do some soul-searching and wanted to understand herself “outside” of the fashion bubble.
She moved from Italy to New York, finished her degree at the Jersey City branch of Italy’s Florence Academy of Art and started working at Sapar Contemporary, a Tribeca art gallery, where she serves as the liaison for international artists.
“I’ve always wanted to be on the art-making side, but I am drawn to everything that happens on the other side,” says Ferrer.
Now she is once again ready for her close-up. The Brooklyn resident is co-writing a book (expected out next year) with her father, examining the timeless appeal of her grandmother’s style. She recently acted in an independent film and just curated her first art exhibition.
“Ideas Get Dressed” opened last week at Sapar Contemporary and runs through April 18. The exhibition explores the creative process of fashion designers including some of the industry’s most celebrated names such as Zac Posen and Manolo Blahnik.
“We all have to wear clothes so we take it for granted. But it’s an art form to me,” she says. “The best way to show that is to show what the individual’s process is behind it. Designers have this particular vision and it’s interesting to me the way they execute it.”
To that end, gallery-goers will see how Blahnik creates intricate, playful sketches and that Posen doesn’t begin his illustrations until the garment is almost finished, because he likes to drape on the dress form to first understand the structure of the garment.
One designer not included is Hubert de Givenchy, who died last week at 91. He often dressed Hepburn and created her iconic little black dress in “Breakfast at Tiffany’s.”
“It feels like a family member passed away, even if I only met him a few times when I was smaller,” says Ferrer, who doesn’t have any of her grandmother’s Givenchy numbers, but does have a few of her cashmere Ralph Lauren turtlenecks and a gold heart necklace.
“It’s a funny relationship I have to these objects,” she says. “Honestly I forget that the sweaters were hers and I wear them all the time. Then I remember, wow, this was Audrey Hepburn’s, maybe I should try and not get paint on it. But the gold chain I’ve never even worn, because I’m terrified of losing it. It’s probably the most precious thing I own.”
Ferrer — who lives with her boyfriend near Dumbo — has a supporting role in “The Man in the Attic,” a psychological thriller due out this fall. Director Constantine Venetopoulos met Ferrer through a friend and instantly wanted to work with her.
“She has this old-soul aspect to her. It’s almost like she is from another time,” says Venetopoulos. “There is some element in [her] DNA that [makes her] able to transport and become this other person.”
But Ferrer isn’t packing her bags for Hollywood just yet.
“I’m acting very gently and very slowly. I want to be able to have the freedom to be part of artistic projects I believe in.”
But it’s her grandmother’s legacy off-camera that she’s taken up with the most gusto. Hepburn was a tireless ambassador for UNICEF in an era before celebrities aligned themselves with causes. Now, Ferrer is the ambassador to the US for the UN’s High Commissioner for Refugees, and recently visited refugees in Greece.
“[Her UNICEF work] was the thing that made her most fulfilled,” says Ferrer. “I would love to think that she would be super proud that I am carrying this on.”
ncG1vNJzZmimqaW8tMCNnKamZ2Jlfnl7j2xmanFflsKlvsSyZKGdoJfCs7rSZp6rmZ6ZsaLBxqGrnqpdnsBuwMeeZJqmpJ56rK3RnZisoJmWu3A%3D