The appointment of producer and singer Pharrell Williams as creative director of menswear for Louis Vuitton complements an effort at the luxury brand to incorporate streetwear fashion into its portfolio
Producer and singer Pharrell Williams will serve as creative director for luxury brand Louis Vuitton’s menswear collections, filling a role that has been vacant since 2021 and continuing an effort by Louis Vuitton in recent years to incorporate streetwear style and utilize celebrities.
Williams, who has collaborated with Louis Vuitton in 2004 and 2008, will present his first collection for the brand in June at Men’s Fashion Week in Paris, the company announced. Pharrell Williams has won 13 Grammy Awards and works for YELLOW, a nonprofit founded by Williams in 2019 that works for equity in public education.
He has designed apparel for the Billionaire Boys Club and skate-inspired shoe brand Ice Cream since both brands were founded in 2005.
Williams is the second prominent musician to partner with LVMH, the company that owns Louis Vuitton, after Rihanna was hired to develop luxury clothing line Fenty in 2019.
Williams is also the second African-American to be named chief designer of a European luxury fashion brand, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Abloh, who held the post from 2018 until his passing in 2021, was the first.
The hire complements an effort by Louis Vuitton to incorporate streetwear fashion into its brand, following a collaboration with skate brand Supreme in 2017 and the signing of Virgil Abloh, founder of luxury streetwear brand Off-White, the following year.
Career with a connection to fashion
Williams, a 13-time Grammy winner, is a record producer who rose to prominence in the late 1990s as part of the hip-hop duo The Neptunes. He is credited with four #1 songs on the Billboard Hot 100, including his song “Happy”, Robin Thicke’s “Blurred Lines”, Snoop Dogg’s “Drop It Like It’s Hot” and Ludacris’ “Money Maker”.
Pharrell has also been nominated for two Academy Awards, including Best Original Song for “Happy” and Best Picture as producer of the 2017 film “Hidden Figures”.
He later partnered with Japanese fashion designer Nigo – now the creative director of Kenzo, another brand owned by LVMH – to found streetwear brands Billionaire Boys Club and Ice Cream. In 2004, Williams collaborated with Marc Jacobs, then creative director of Louis Vuitton, on a line of sunglasses.
Since then, Pharrell Williams has partnered and collaborated with other fashion and luxury brands including Chanel, Moncler and Adidas, as well as launching a skincare line, Humanrace.
Numbers
$21.4 billion. That’s the revenue that Louis Vuitton recorded in 2022, according to LVMH. This is the first time the brand has surpassed $20 billion in revenue in a single year.
$213.7 billion. Bernard Arnault, founder and chairman of LVMH, is the richest person in the world, with a net worth of $213.7 billion, according to Forbes estimates.