This season all but belongs to Fifth Harmony. Ally Brooke, Normani Kordei, Dinah Jane, and Lauren Jauregui just released their third album, Fifth Harmony, and have dominated the airwaves as a newly four-member group. (See: That epic VMAs performance last month.) Beyond the recording studio, though, they’ve nailed the balance of coordinating their fashion as a group while letting their individual styles shine. Oh, and they’re going to their very first New York Fashion Week this year.
“This is our first [time] attending fashion week together,” Dinah told Glamour after a recent boxing class at Gotham Gym, as part of Reebok’s Fit to Fashion series during NYFW. “So for us to be here right now, it’s cool for us to just open up our minds and step outside the box for future styles.”
Fifth Harmony at Reebok’s Fit to Fashion event.
On their calendars for the week? The Harper’s Bazaar Bazaar Icons party and the Phillip Plein show. Plus, the members of Fifth Harmony, too, are keeping their eyes glued to their screens as the new Spring 2018 collections come out (celebrities: They are like us!)—they couldn’t pick just one collection they were most excited to see, but narrowed down the list to Jeremy Scott, Opening Ceremony, Tom Ford, and, of course, Phillip Plein. And, after Lauren’s mention, all four members gave a “Yas!” for one line in particular: Fenty Puma by Rihanna.
When it comes to sourcing inspiration for their looks, Fifth Harmony looks beyond Fashion Week and to the pop icons of the early-aughts. And with a long history of kickass female groups in music before them, there’s plenty of style inspo to go around. Normani and Lauren both cited Destiny’s Child as major influences. “In every aspect, stylistically, creatively, and like visually, they were just like [great],” Lauren says. Another go-to they share is TLC, “because they’re just like edgy but still cute and sexy, but a little tomboy,” Dinah adds. “I love that balance.”
PHOTO: Jun Sato
Fifth Harmony onstage at RockKCorps Celebration in Japan.
If you’ve been following Fifth Harmony’s trajectory over the past few years, you know not to expect head-to-toe matching outfits from the foursome—instead, they try to incorporate similar stylistic elements into individual ensembles so that each member’s ensemble has a point of view. “We’ve definitely evolved, and I think that we’ve come into our own knowing exactly what it is that we like. [W]e’re individuals as well, obviously, but at the same time we always try to keep a cohesiveness,” Normani explains.
Some of that style evolution comes from working with a stylist who understands the aesthetic they’re going for at this moment in their musical career: confident, cool, and elevated. “We just got with our amazing stylist, her name’s Jessica Paster, and she’s just completely transformed us,” Normani says. “She’s helping elevate us, and it’s really helping meet the level that our music is also at right now.”
PHOTO: Christopher Polk/MTV1617
That transformation was on display at the VMAs last month—both on the red carpet and during their jaw-dropping performance. Don’t just take our word for it—Fifth Harmony says it was their favorite performance (and group costume) to date. Why? “Just because it was super in sync, and I think what I love too is we tried something different,” Dinah says. “It was a black, neon body suit attire. We all wore it differently but we definitely incorporated the black sparkles.”
Normani, for one, loved the silver puffer jackets they wore for the first portion of the performance (below). “At first, we weren’t really sure if we were going to go for it, but it’s like something that’s like stepping outside of the box,” she says.
PHOTO: Frederick M. Brown
You’d expect such an #OTT look to be the result of a lot of planning—but in this case, it was the total opposite. Apparently, Fifth Harmony didn’t nail down its VMAs ensemble until the night before… and the looks weren’t totally finalized until an hour before they hit the stage. “We went through four different creative options before the actual performance, because like trial and error and trying to figure out exactly we wanted and how what we wanted was going to work itself out,” Lauren explains. “And in doing that so many times, we ended up in a place where we just didn’t have anything. And we were like sh—t, okay. What are we going to do? And we figured it out. Thank God.”
PHOTO: Jon Kopaloff
Fifth Harmony on the MTV VMAs red carpet.
TG, indeed. And though scoring a Fashion Week invite—as a group!—is a major milestone, Fifth Harmony has priorities beyond keeping their outfits in-sync; for starters, the foursome is concerned with remaining a tight-knit squad. “It’s really important that each of us support each other in whatever we have going on and right now obviously the focus is the group, because we’ve so much happen in the past several weeks,” Ally says. “We’ve really been focusing on that and our new album. For us, it’s really great to have that unity and that community where we can talk to each other about something that we want to do or something that we’re working on. But right now is just a time for the group so we’re very, very happy.”
What can we expect from the group looking forward, style or otherwise? Normani mentioned an upcoming trip to South America, but 5H’s other plans are still under wraps. (Hopefully some more Fashion Weeks around the globe?) In the meantime, we’ll keep an eye out for more lewks from the gang as they promote their album this fall.
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