On an unreasonably warm after-
noon in August, Law Roach is sit-
ting at the kitchen table in his
agent’s Spanish Colonial house in
the Hollywood Hills West neighbor-
hood above the Sunset Strip, chat-
ting about his summer adventures
and what’s next.
In the living room is a small gath-
ering, including a photographer
and a makeup artist, prepping for a
photo shoot. The globetrotting styl-
ist — whose client roster includes
“Euphoria” star and fashion de-
signer Zendaya, singer Ariana
Grande, singer-actress Mary J.
Blige, actor Tom Holland and ac-
tress Tiffany Haddish — is dressed
in a lightweight, white thawb that
he picked up in Dubai and a gray
hat from his friend’s line, Larry
Sims Collection by Central Avenue.
He has on Maison Margiela
boots, which he later removes to go
barefoot. And on this hot, sticky
day, he’s pants-free. Wearing them
really wasn’t an option, he says. “I’m
just in this thing in my life right
now,” Roach says. “I just want to feel
comfortable. ... I really don’t have a
rhyme or reason to it. It’s my cos-
tume right now. I think every super-
hero has to have a costume.”
Sipping a glass of white wine, he
recounts what was supposed to be a
relaxing, do-nothing-until-you’re-
tired-of-doing-nothing vacation to
Indonesia. “I kind of miscalculated
how far Bali was from Los Angeles.
... I didn’t get a chance to be bored in
Bali, so I came back and I was feel-
ing a little bit cheated,” Roach says.
Now, there’s more work to do —
new projects to consider, the next
A-list star to dress, the next big
fashion moment. “I travel a lot for
work,” he says. “It’s, like, fashion
week and I’m with another client in
London and another client in
Greece. ... You know, every time
fashion week is coming or when it
comes I get a whole new arsenal of
things to play with and things to
spark my creativity.”
Pants or no pants, Roach, who
was featured on the cover of the
Hollywood Reporter’s Stylists and
Stars issue in 2017 (and is on the list
of top stylists this year), has made a
name for himself, and in an era in
which anyone with an opinion and
an Instagram account can claim to
be a stylist, he has gone next-level
by getting a trademark on “Image
Architect.” In his case, he has proof
to back up the fancy title — and an
explanation.
“It kind of came about because
I’m a very self-reflective person,” he
says. “And when I first started in
this business, I kind of was going
over the way I felt like I was doing
things. I wanted to approach clients
and projects not as if I was just pick-
ing out the best dress but [as if
there] was a plan to it.” Roach com-
pares his style research process to
that of an architect working on
blueprints. “It kind of motivated me
to feel like I was doing more than
just putting a pretty girl in a pretty
dress.”
His approach to fashion and
styling has worked. On Thursday,
Roach was honored as stylist of the
year during the Harlem’s Fashion
Row awards in New York. Also, on
Sunday, he and Zendaya are set to
see their sartorial efforts with de-
signer Tommy Hilfiger, as part of
the latest Tommy X Zendaya col-
laboration, presented at the Apollo
Theater during New York Fashion
Week before the see-now, buy-now
collection goes on sale to the public
on tommy.com and shop.nord
strom.comand at select Tommy
Hilfiger and Nordstrom stores.
Serving as the creative director
to Zendaya, Roach says the new,
1970s-inspired ready-to-wear collec-
tion, which includes apparel, lin-
gerie, sleepwear, footwear, a hobo
bag and more, gives a hat tip to no-
table black women and trailblazers
who came before. Sunday’s show
continues the celebration of black
life and culture, which was the
theme of the Tommy X Zendaya
runway show in Paris in March.
(The Battle of Versailles-themed
show featured all black models such
as Pat Cleveland, Beverly Johnson
and show closer Grace Jones.)
About the latest Tommy X Zen-
daya runway show, Roach says, “It’s
a celebration of Harlem and the
people of Harlem. Yeah, I’m excited
about that.”
Although he’s widely known for
his work with Zendaya, Roach had
big Instagram moments with an-
other star in recent years when he
transformed singer Céline Dion’s
wardrobe and helped turn her into a
front-row couture darling. In 2016,
Roach put Dion in Vetements’ “Ti-
tanic”-themed hoodie, and the in-
ternet went crazy. Although the two
currently aren’t working together,
Roach says he still has fond memo-
ries of the 51-year-old songstress
and the story he wanted the world
to know about her through her
clothes.
“It became my mission to show
people, like, Céline Dion is cool,” he
says. “She’s young and she has a
young spirit and she knows fashion
like the back of her hand. She stud-
ies it. She reads all the fashion
magazines still. She buys couture —
all these things that people didn’t
know. I went back and I built this
blueprint of what we would do. ... I
really disrupted the idea of what
people thought she was.” As a re-
sult, he introduced her to designers
and streetwear brands, including
Off-White, that she didn’t know or
wear at the time.
Back then, he says, “She just
wanted to be happy. It was a few
months after René [Angélil, Dion’s
manager and husband] had
passed, and so the fashion and
dressing up and all that kind ofhelped her grieve.”
Roach also went on to elevate
the red-carpet looks of Haddish.
“She just wants to feel pretty,” he
says, adding that Haddish looked
perfect in a black Galia Lahav dress
at the premiere of her recent film,
“The Kitchen.” “She’s like every
other woman in the world. ... Her
spirit is, like, incredible. I spoke to
her this morning actually.”
The women who want to work
with him, he says, aren’t looking to
be subtle with their wardrobes. “I
think they work with me because
I’m a storyteller, but you also have
to have a level of confidence,” says
Roach, who has worked on more
than a dozen of Grande’s videos,
two of the singer’s tours and twofragrance ads. “I think ‘... you’ is the
ultimate sign of confidence,” Roach
says with colorful defiance.
“There’s nothing more liberating
than that. ‘I did it. I wore it. I loved
it.’ If you think otherwise or your
opinion is different from that, then,
‘ ... you.’”
Although he doesn’t go on about
his personal life, just saying he isn’t
great at making new friends or dat-
ing, he says he’s mostly happy to-
day, and work remains a constant
priority. (“I struggle with making
sure that the sacrifices weren’t in
vain,” he says.)
Despite his success and acco-
lades, Roach says he’s here to serve
a greater purpose in Hollywood.
His goal is to be a role model and
open doors for more black people
and other people of color, especially
because he has found celebrity
styling to be a profession that glam-
orizes white female stylists. Also, he
says, he ultimately wants to help
black people live in abundance, not
paycheck to paycheck.
“I always say, like, it’s not talent
because I think we are the most tal-
ented people on the planet,” he
says. “I think it’s opportunity and I
still feel like there isn’t a lot of op-
portunity for people who look like
me. ... I feel like if I’m going to leave a
legacy and I’m going to really get to
a position where my work and the
things I’ve done really create an av-
enue for somebody else, especially
somebody of color, then I can’t be
complacent on things I’ve ... done.
You’ve gotta keep moving.”
Thinking about his early days in
L.A., Roach says he didn’t have
black role models in the Hollywood
stylist community. Instead, he ini-
tially got tips from stylist-turned-
designer Rachel Zoe.
With her Bravo TV show, “The
Rachel Zoe Project,” which ran for
five seasons, Roach and others
were given a behind-the-scenes
look at the L.A. styling world. He
says he briefly tried Zoe’s approach
but realized he just needed to be
himself. What stuck with him, he
says, is when a young admirer ap-
proached him and told him, “‘Iknow I can because you did.’ It was
so profound to me because I didn’t
have anyone I could say that to.”
He says that’s when he realized
how important representation is. “I
always wanted to be a ‘black styl-
ist,’ ” says Roach, who has also
worked with Oscar winner Anne
Hathaway. “I always want to be
known as that. I always want to be
African American. ... I wanted to be
considered one of the best. I wanted
my name to be spoken in the same
conversations as my counterparts,
you know, whoever that may be.”
For emphasis, Roach’s agent,
Kent Belden, owner and founder of
bicoastal the Only Agency, added:
“Law is literally one of the busiest
people we represent. He came to
L.A. with a plan in his head and
manifested that plan based on
what he saw on Rachel Zoe’s televi-
sion show — and made it, in many
ways, even bigger.”
To reach this level of success,
Roach bootstrapped his L.A. life
using his creativity, storytelling, eye
for fashion and determination. He
says the life he wanted was different
from the tough one he had growing
up on Chicago’s South Side as the
eldest of five children. He used to go
“junking” with his grandmother,
Eloise, who showed him the world
of thrift shopping. A turning point
came in 2009 when rapper-turned-
Kardashian-husband Kanye West
visited Roach’s now-defunct vin-
tage store, Deliciously Vintage. As a
result of West’s visit, new customers
came to the store.
Back then, Roach also was
working on bigger dreams. He
landed a deal with Atlantic Records
to style R&B singer K. Michelle.
Through a family friend, Law was
introduced to his now longtime cli-
ent and friend, Zendaya, the former
Disney actress who appeared this
year in Sony’s “Spider-Man: Far
From Home” and HBO’s “Eupho-
ria.” They have worked together
since she was 13 years old.
Juggling several projects, Roach
stayed in Chicago while regularly
flying to New York and L.A., where
he has lived for the last six years.
Roach calls his early days styling
Zendaya a “passion project.” “I be-
lieved in her,” he says. “I thought
she was special.” Zendaya has be-
come a rightful standout on the red
carpet with look after look picked
by Roach as she evolved from a
budding teen star to a leading ac-
tress.
Before she met Roach, the 23-
year-old actress took a different ap-
proach to dressing. “I would go to
Target with my dad and try to put
outfits together myself,” she says by
phone last month during a trip to
Greece with Roach.
Early on, Roach created a fash-
ion strategy for the young star. He
borrowed pieces already worn by
other celebrities, hoping to get Zen-
daya in the Who Wore It Best? fea-
tures in magazines. The move
worked.
“He became a brother to me,”
Zendaya says about Roach. “He’s
my family. We’re very close. I’m very
lucky to have that. He’s watched me
kind of grow up.” The two talk daily,
she says, adding: “He always en-
couraged me to do what I felt was
right. If I felt good, that was the only
thing that mattered. He taught me
how to be fearless and how not give
an eff. ... To me, Law is a visionary.
He can see hair and makeup when
he just looks at something, and I’m
kind of just like his Barbie, which is
kind of nice.”
What are her favorite Roach-
styled looks? She says one would be
the Joan of Arc-inspired custom
metallic Versace gown with chain-
mail touches she wore to the Met
Gala in New York last year. Another
is the monarch butterfly-print
gown by Moschino that she wore to
the 2017 Australian premiere of
“The Greatest Showman.” “I tried
it on and fell in love with it,” she
says.
Although she admits she misses
Roach when he’s working with
other clients, Zendaya says she ne-
ver gets jealous that they don’t ex-
clusively work together: “He’s an in-
credible talent, and I’m glad people
are recognizing him on his journey.”
In Roach’s eyes, Zendaya had a
fashion milestone this year at the
Met Gala. As a tribute to her former
Disney days, Zendaya went to the
Camp-themed gala dressed as Cin-
derella, in a Tommy Hilfiger gown.
With a magic wand in hand, Roach,
who accompanied the actress,
bibbidi-bobbidi-boo’d Zendaya’s
gown, which lighted up and un-
folded to the delight of onlookers. It
was another fashion moment for
the pair.
“It was like our way of kind of
leaving that behind,” Roach says
about the Disney years, “and giving
people that last moment of this Dis-
ney princess. ... She was moving
into ‘Euphoria.’ ”
But for this Hollywood tale, no
fairy godfather was necessary. A
thoughtful Image Architect was, he
says with a smile, “to kind of help
her transform and move into the
second chapter of her career.”LAW ROACHsays he wants to create opportunities in the fashion industry for people of color.Marcus YamLos Angeles TimesThe man who styles Zendaya
ZENDAYAmarches in a Joan of Arc-inspired Versace gown at
the 2018 Met Gala, left, and spreads her wings in a monarch
butterfly-print gown by Moschino at a 2017 film premiere.Noam GalaiGetty ImagesLaw Roach’s collaborations with the ‘Euphoria’ star dazzle, with a collection set for
New York Fashion Week. He’s an Image Architect (trademarked) and ‘black stylist’
By Marques Harper
Lisa Maree WilliamsGetty ImagesLATIMES.COM/IMAGE SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 8, 2019P3
{ PEOPLE }