The self-described image architect’s new tome, ‘How to Build a Fashion Icon,’ combines advice and memoir, as well as dishy anecdotes about the powerful women he’s dressed, from Celine Dion to Megan Thee Stallion.
Anyone thinking Law Roach‘s 2023 retirement stemmed from a desire to slow down would be contradicted by his schedule this week alone. The self-described “image architect,” celebrated for conceptualizing high-wattage looks for Zendaya, Kerry Washington, Celine Dion and other powerful Hollywood women, is on a different plane almost every day this week, starting out in his native Chicago before jetting to New York for a Today show appearance, to Paris for the final days of the Spring 2025 ready-to-wear collections, then back to the U.S. for an appearance at the Savannah College of Art & Design in Atlanta, and finally ending the week in Brooklyn, where he will appear at CultureCon ’24, the annual conference for Black creatives and entrepreneurs.
Before his March 2023 Instagram post, featuring a graphic of the word “Retired” in bold red, generated shockwaves among fashion fans around the globe, Roach easily would be considered one of the style industry’s foremost creatives and entrepreneurs — and that’s never more true than this week. His first book, How to Build a Fashion Icon: Notes on Confidence from the World’s Only Image Architect (Abrams Image, $28), debuts today. Equal parts heartfelt memoir, deliciously detailed fashion anecdotes, and self-help tips, the book explores Roach’s dramatic career before turning the lens back on readers, showing how they can apply the lessons to their own life.
How to Build a Fashion Icon by Law Roach (courtesy Abrams Image)
Courtesy of Abrams Image
“I wanted something tangible, something easy, with action items I thought could really help the reader,” Roach tells The Hollywood Reporter. “The retirement honestly gave me the time to actually do it, but I was also looking for something to give me purpose. I was looking for something to be creative, but I also feel like I have been in service of people for so long in a certain way, and now I wanted to be of service in a different way.”
Roach confesses that the title is mildly deceptive, as his desire indeed was to craft a self-help book rooted in confidence, though How to Build a Fashion Icon is a sexier sell. “I wanted to hide the medicine in the ice cream,” he says with a laugh. “If I wrote a book called How to Get Great Confidence, I felt like no one would want to read it from me. But I genuinely believe that confidence is the most beautiful thing we can all put on, and when you achieve a certain level of confidence, you can wear whatever you want to wear.”
The ice cream, in this case, comes in the form of copious anecdotes about the stars he dresses and clearly adores. The book is dedicated to the woman he calls “my little sister, my muse, my close collaborator and my biggest advocate: Zendaya Coleman.” Roach has worked with the Euphoria and Dune star since 2011, when she was a 14-year-old Disney Channel actress attending the premiere of Justin Bieber’s Never Say Never in Los Angeles. But in recounting an episode that occurred three years later, when Zendaya arrived at Lincoln Center for New York Fashion Week and attracted a cadre of photographers, Roach explains in the book how he helped the young star turn that entrance into a viral sensation. “We heard the shutter of a few cameras. I whispered in her ear: ‘They aren’t photographing you because you’re a celebrity, they are photographing you because you’re beautiful,’” he writes. “I wasn’t lying to her, and I never would — it was the truth, and it was important she knew it! Four photographers became six; six became 10. I watched her stand up a little taller, and the elegance we both knew she possessed became a touch more prominent. The photographers became a mob that returned day after day for the rest of that week, photographing anything and everything she wore.”
Zendaya and Law Roach attend the World Premiere of ‘Dune: Part Two’ in Leicester Square on February 15 in London.
Samir Hussein/WireImage
“I don’t think I would be able to exist in the way I do if not for her collaboration and her love and loyalty to me,” Roach says. “Our relationship is very special. Sometimes she’s my best friend, my annoying little sister, my therapist, my assistant stylist; she wears so many hats in my world, in my life.”
Following the dishy behind-the-scenes stories and details of the iconic labels that dressed his glamorous clients — including Ariana Grande, Mary J. Blige and Megan Thee Stallion — Roach ends each chapter with “Take Action” sections, pointedly designed to inspire the reader. “I really wanted to write a self-help book; that’s the genre I see it as,” he says. “Although you get anecdotes from my work with clients and parts of my own life, at the end of that there are lessons. It could be as simple as suggesting you go to a department store or a boutique to try on things you didn’t think you’d like, because our palette for fashion matures just as our palate for food does. My publisher wanted more of a memoir, and maybe that would have touched people, but I really wanted to help people.”
Law Roach and Celine Dion attend the 66th GRAMMY Awards at Crypto.com Arena on February 4 in Los Angeles.
Emma McIntyre/Getty Images for The Recording Academy
In between the onstage and red-carpet highlights — including receiving the first-ever Stylist Award from the Council of Fashion Designers of America in 2022 — Roach also reminisces about his Chicago upbringing; his close relationships with his mother and grandmother; and how, while still young, he fell in love with vintage clothes, a passion that led to opening a boutique, Deliciously Vintage, in the city’s Arts District. That decision was integral to putting Roach on the path to fame, and in telling that story, he advises readers to think about they view and communicate their own goals. “Share your dreams widely,” he writes in chapter eight. “Some people believe in not talking about what you’re doing until it’s done. ‘Work in silence,’ they say. Not me. I believe in sharing your hopes and dreams with other people and talking about what you’re planning. It’s a way of manifesting to say it out loud.”
Law Roach and Kerry Washington attend 2022 CFDA Fashion Awards on November 7, 2022 at Cipriani South Street in New York City.
Sean Zanni/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images
Take Roach’s next project, for instance. It doesn’t debut until Tuesday, Oct. 8, but he was happy to discuss it a week in advance. Along with Kent Belden, founder and CEO of The Only Agency (and Roach’s agent since 2016), Roach acquired School of Style, an online education provider that offers certification courses in fashion styling, hair, makeup and other subjects. “It’s for up-and-coming stylists, as well as working stylists who can take collegiate-level course work to help improve what they already know,” Roach explains. “Among the elements that make me so proud, we’re offering an elective that’s based solely on financial literacy; a lot of freelancers coming into this business don’t understand about paying taxes and setting up corporations, so we want to make sure they have those skills.” With The Only Agency’s offices in Los Angeles, New York, London and Nashville, Roach also believes the platform can play a significant role in exposing students to opportunities in fashion cities around the globe.
Ultimately Roach knows there is little about his life these days that might be termed “retired.” But School of Style is key to a pay-it-forward attitude he believes is central to his purpose, an idea equally true of How to Build a Fashion Icon. “The book was written purely for the intention to be of service and help people find their confidence,” he says. “If it can help change one person’s life, I’ll be happy.”