“It’s giving Cher,” celebrity stylist Savannah Mendoza told me from Austin, where she was prepping to dress the small town of Crawford’s second-biggest export, country singer Mickey Guyton, for Sunday night’s Country Music Television Awards. Mendoza was referring to the dress she and Guyton, a nominee for Collaborative Video of the Year for “Nothing Compares to You,” with Kane Brown, had chosen: a silver-fringed gown that would have looked just as at home in a banquette at Studio 54 as on the Moody Center red carpet. 

For the second year in a row, the CMT left its Nashville HQ behind in favor of a “more fun, more chill” Austin ceremony. “CMTs is a little more trendy, because it’s in Austin—different from the CMAs, which is more classic red-carpet glam,” Mendoza said. To meet the moment, she and Guyton opted for the Retrofête Belle embe©llished fringe dress (currently sold out, you won’t be surprised to hear), with its Cher-meets-glam country aesthetic. “It was between two Retrofête dresses,” Mendoza said. “One of them was a little more simple, with great metallic fabric. But then I got this one for our second round of fittings: this amazing sheer black dress with a halter and rhinestone fringe. It felt like a total showstopper to me.” 

The rest of Guyton’s glam team took the Cher memo and ran. Back in the seventies, the Goddess of Pop, who favored dramatic gowns, “always kept the hair very sleek and silky,” said Guyton’s hair stylist, Jazmin Kelly. “I wanted a flowy, really natural, effortless blowout, because with this one it’s really all about the gown.”

Makeup artist Emily Gray Higgins paid special attention to the eye area. “I love the way Cher plays up her eyes, and I wanted Mickey’s eyes to be the center of attention,” she said. She applied top and bottom mink lashes (Lilly Lashes, in style “Miami”) and went with a subtle purple smoky eye—cool tones to complement Guyton’s silver fringe and silver manicure—created from the six shades housed in the Lisa Eldridge Myth Palette. “Mickey and Cher both look great in a purple eyeshadow look,” she said.

Makeup artist Emily Gray Higgins paired a purple smoky eye with “a lash moment.”Courtesy of Emily Gray Higgins

Guyton recently described her home in Crawford, about 22 miles west of Waco, to Texas Monthly as “the actual country, on gravel dirt roads. If you saw where my grandma lived, it doesn’t get more country.” Despite her background, the singer has fought to find her place in country music. Although she lost her category last night, she talked on the red carpet about her new empowerment song, “Woman,” and detailed how Beyoncé sent her flowers on Cowboy Carter’s release day to thank her for opening doors for Black artists. It’s no surprise Guyton is taking inspiration from one of the world’s most famous divas.