There is no stylist waiting in the penthouse of The Raleigh Hotel in Miami. There is no rack of designer clothes, no table piled with jewels. Every article of clothing and glittering accessory for this shoot arrives with N.E.R.D frontman, super-producer, style arbiter and newly-minted jewelry designer, Pharrell Williams.
He strolls in just before noon wearing a black T-shirt and red baseball hat from his own line, Billionaire Boys Club, a pair of high-tops that are by A Bathing Ape, and a diamond-encrusted Jacob & Co.-designed keychain that's hooked on the belt loop of the dark, slim-cut Levi's he picked up in Tokyo last week and from which the key to his Ferrari Enzo dangles. It's a look of studied nonchalance that Kanye West might spend an hour calculating, but when Williams says it’s just something he threw together, somehow I believe him. And that's the beauty of being Pharrell Williams. Since everything he owns is already imbued with his own stylistic stamp, he can roll out of bed, throw on a pair of jeans, a T-shirt and his most comfortable kicks and, like that, he's ready for his close-up.
"Style is about who you are, where you're going, what's comfortable," he says with a shrug, stepping out onto the wraparound balcony where the photographer waits. "It's your attitude that makes it hot." He presses the sole of one sneaker against the wall and peeks out at the camera from under the stiff brim of his hat, his 4.5 carat diamond studs and 23 carat Asscher-cut ring, both designed by his close friend and gem mentor Lorraine Schwartz, glinting in the Miami sun. As the camera clicks, he admits that he has never used a personal stylist, which makes sense. He's one of the world's most watched stylemakers -- a setter of trends, not a follower. Still he feels the need to clarify. “I don’t want to sound snotty or cocky," he says for the first of several times. "Let's just say I'm blessed to have my own company. Whatever I want, I can have it made."
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