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On the Cover: Rachel Bilson

O.C. scene stealer Rachel Bilson takes her act to the big screen.
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By Dennis Hensley

Asked to name her favourite perk of TV stardom, Rachel Bilson, who plays sweet but spoiled good-time girl Summer Roberts on The O.C., doesn’t think long. “I got a Chanel purse,” she says over tea at a café in L.A.’s San Fernando Valley. “Black, one from the New York collection.” But Bilson, wearing a chocolate-coloured sweater over a white T-shirt, black jeans and vintage Cleopatra-style sandals, is self-aware enough to know what rhapsodizing over celeb freebies comes off like. “It’s backwards. When you can afford it, you get it for free. But, you know, as a girl, when you get a new purse it makes you happy.”

Which is not to say that she isn’t actively contributing to the retail market. “I have a shopping problem. Am I getting help? I should be. It’s bad! I’m a huge vintage person. I hate malls. I go to little boutiques. I love flea markets and all these amazing smaller designers,” she says, listing Mayle, Vena Cava, Jenni Kayne and Derek Lam as favourites. Of the pressure to nail a “look” every time she leaves the house, Bilson, who is often clocked in Marc Jacobs, says, “If I like something, I’ll wear it. You can’t please other people.” She gets a little help along the way, too. “My friend Nicole Chavez is starting to be a stylist. We’re on the same page. She’ll help me out, get the clothes for me. You have to have someone.”

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Kendra writes:

Rachel Bilson is the bomb!

—posted August 31, 2006 at 10 p.m.

darina writes:

Rachel Bilson: the best.

—posted September 18, 2006 at 2:03 a.m.

Sahira writes:

My god, I love Rachel Bilson. She's my favourite actress, and honestly, I dont have many.

—posted October 2, 2006 at 8:54 p.m.

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