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Rihanna, Zac Posen to make fashion rock
09/06/2006 4:14 PM, AP
Samantha Critchell
Fashion will rock this week when two young artists — singer Rihanna and designer Zac Posen — get together for a charity event.
The two are teaming to create the outfits the Barbados-born Rihanna will wear for the Fashion Rocks concert, the high-wattage kickoff to New York Fashion Week. The concert, which includes headliner Elton John along with Christina Aguilera, Beyonce, Kanye West, Faith Hill, Tim McGraw and the Pussycat Dolls, will be held at Radio City Music Hall Thursday and televised on CBS Friday night. All proceeds benefit John's AIDS foundation.
"Rihanna's incredibly beautiful and a good dancer. She's a rare star with a full complement of talents," said Posen, 25, during the final fittings for her dresses earlier this week. "I started watching her on `Video Wake-up' on MTV."
Meanwhile, as 18-year-old Rihanna saw her star rise this summer with her top 10 song "Unfaithful," and as she posed for more and more photo shoots, she noticed that the clothes she always seemed drawn to were Posen's.
Once she found out that she'd be performing at the concert, she contacted Posen about her wardrobe: She'd need a dress for the red carpet, another to perform and another for a "secret appearance," she explained.
Posen said that meant she'd need to be able to move in all her outfits. No problem. "Our clothing is made for dancing," he told The Associated Press with a smile.
Rihanna arrived at Posen's downtown Manhattan studio in a ladylike jacket — that also served as her top — with trendy skinny jeans.
Soon after disappearing into a changing room, she emerged in a clingy pink V-neck sweater dress with a pink and silver chiffon satin slip as an overlay.
Posen said: "She can flirt with the camera in this. ... It's naughty, it's sweet. There's a touch of nostalgia. It had to be elegant rock 'n' roll, not gaudy rock 'n' roll."
The next outfit was a seafoam green babydoll dress with a V-neck halter and gold sunbursts around the hem.
He was trying to play up her "real figure," Posen explained. "Young people look up to her. Rihanna has an ideal body for clothing."
"I love that it makes my waist look like it's two inches!" Rihanna gushed. "But there's also movement and I'm comfortable because it's not too short."
The duo (and their rather large entourages at the fittings) seemed to like each dress that came out more than the one before. Other outstanding looks were a white stretch satin dress with a V to the navel, pleats at the waist and a bouncy, flirty skirt — think of Marilyn Monroe's famous dress that blew upward with the subway wind — and a silver gown with a halter top and mermaid-style bottom.
"Choosing is the hardest part," Rihanna said.
As Posen nipped and tucked the dresses with pins, Rihanna said the whole experience of Fashion Rocks and being outfitted by a well-known designer seemed unimaginable only a year or two ago.
"Growing up in Barbados, I was just a regular girl," she said. "But I was always interested in fashion. Barbados is so far away from everything else, my friend and I would look at magazines and say, `So that's what's hot in the rest of the world.' We'd wear sweaters, boots — we didn't care if that's what was in style."
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On the Net:
http://fashionrocks06.com
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