Today, Rihanna announced the return of her Fenty x Puma collaboration with a simple remark posted on Instagram: “She’s back.”
Although the musician-turned-mogul laid-back announcement may have been characteristically Rihanna, the news itself is everything but expected.
Rihanna’s association with Puma stretches back over a decade: initially joining the company as creative director in 2014, she then created a series of sell-out shoes and presented several presentations at New York Fashion Week, getting good accolades from critics and fans alike. Her most recent collection for Puma was published in 2017, with the relationship putting on an unplanned pause as Rihanna explored other ventures.
In 2019, Rihanna launched Fenty, her ready-to-wear collection with LVMH, becoming the first Black woman to create a premium line with the heavyweight fashion giant; two years later, the company folded amid concerns of dwindling sales. Thus yet, no more specifics about what the new cooperation with Puma will include—or, indeed, when it will arrive—have been released publicly.
During her previous tenure at Puma, Rihanna quickly established a handful of style signatures that lent a more playful twist on the athleisure staples dominating the market during the early 2010s, including chunky-soled sneakers, brightly-coloured bodysuits, oversized graphic hoodies, and thigh-high boots.
Although the star invited a select group of pals to pose for the company throughout the years—Cara Delevingne, Slick Woods, and Travis Scott among them—Rihanna was very much the face of the brand and its most effective advocate. Whether she’ll stay at the core of the Fenty x Puma world for its comeback remains to be seen.
The news comes amid what has already been a tumultuous year for Rihanna. The diva made a spectacular return to the stage with her hotly-anticipated Super Bowl halftime show in February. Celebrating her first solo performance in seven years, she rattled off a mix of her best songs while wearing a striking red boiler suit and breastplate by Jonathan Anderson for Loewe, paired with a floor-length Alaïa puffer coat that many saw as a reference to the late André Leon Talley. (The most headline-grabbing component of the performance, however, turned out to be her humorous disclosure that she is currently pregnant with her second kid.) Earlier in January, Rihanna also garnered her first Oscar nomination, garnering a best original song mention for her single “Lift Me” from Black Panther: Wakanda Forever; it was just reported that she will perform the song at the event on March 12
So what, exactly, can we anticipate from the relaunch of Fenty x Puma?
While today’s cryptic announcement offered few clues if the previous collections are anything to go by, expect Rihanna to tap into the current zeitgeist for skin-baring styles—as well as to offer a more inclusive vision for the brand, in keeping with the diverse casting of her runway spectaculars for Savage x Fenty. With the experience of heading up a luxury brand for LVMH under her belt (by all accounts, the musician was involved in even the most granular aspects of the design process during her time running Fenty), Rihanna will approach her vision for Fenty x Puma with both fresh eyes and a new well of experience—so don’t be surprised if there’s an aesthetic overhaul from its previous iteration.
Keep your eye out for outfits stressing comfort and flexibility, too. After revolutionizing maternity style in everything from vintage Chanel to copious amounts of body jewellery while awaiting the arrival of her son last year, one imagines Rihanna would want to make sure some styles are acceptable for the star herself to wear when she’s expecting a baby number two.
As for the specific details of what the cooperation could offer, we’ll have to wait and see. But in the meanwhile, the news that Rihanna is returning to the fashion realm is quite good enough.
