D S,

O N A IR DU
DEB
E FOR NS ON
H A N E Y
H E L JOH SING
WI T
I S T RA C
N K DRES URT
ST Y L
A M - DU T H E CO
L S OF F
IS A G LETE
T A T H
A- L I S by KIRSTE
N FLEMIN
G

The
WOMAN
who gave the NBA
A MAKEOVER y Sil
j a Ma
g g

r a p hy b
o g
phot

W
When Rachel Johnson
speaks, the worlds tallest
millionaires listeneven if
the 37-year-old stylist is telling
them something they dont
want to hear.
Absolutely without ques-
tion, I put them in their place,
says Johnson of her clients,
who include NBA super-
stars LeBron James, Amare
Stoudemire, Chris Bosh and
Chris Paul. Last September,
as New Yorkers were tripping
over themselves to welcome
Stoudemire when he signed a
$100 million contract with the
Knicks, Johnson was work-
Tadashi Shoji
ing on another acquisition: gown, $608,
bloomingdales.com.
Stoudemires ensemble for Jimmy Choo
Fashion Week. Brand sandals, $795,
Jimmy Choo,
After all, he was to be the 212-759-7078.
Ted Rossi cuff, $85,
guest of Vogue editrix Anna tedrossi.com.
Wintour at the Costume
Institute gala at the Metro-
politan Museum of Art. For

nypost.com/pagesixmag 00

PSM_R_JOHNSON6.indd 1 8/29/11 5:19:05 PM


his designer debut, Johnson
dressed him in a dashing baby
blue slim-fit Tom Ford suit.
She recalls the moment
while sipping a flute of ros
at the bar of the Four Seasons
in Midtown. He did not want
to wear this suit. It was a de-
parture from anything he had
worn before, but he was invited
by Anna Wintour to sit front
row at Fashion Week after only
being [in New York] six weeks.
He needed to make a splash!
Johnson says, extending her
arms enthusiastically.
The 6-foot-10-inch trans-
plant from Phoenix finally
relented and wore the suit
with a plaid shirt and tie. That
ensemble, along with others
that week, prompted a ringing
endorsement from Wintour
herself: Amare looked won-
derfully dapper, she told Wall
Street Journal Magazine.
Later, the Knick was profiled
in Vogues March issue by the
magazines dandyish editor-at-
large, Hamish Bowles, who also
played Stoudemire in a hilari-
ous game of one-on-one for a
video that was posted online.
But the larger story of how
NBA players became less
ghetto-fab and more Vogue-fab
should be attributed to Rachel
Johnson.
Johnson dressed Amare
Stoudemire in Tom Ford for
the 2010 Fashions Night Out
show, where he sat front row
next to Serena Williams.
58 nypost.com/pagesixmag
PSM_R_JOHNSON6.indd 2
Diane von
Furstenberg
Judith gown,
$1,600, Diane von
Furstenberg NY,
646-486-4800.
Stuart Weitzman
Steel kidskin
slingbacks, $355,
Stuart Weitzman
stores. Ben-Amun
necklace, $295,
ben-amun.com.
R
Raised in
Englewood, N.J.,
Johnson picked up
her style sense from her
fashionista mother, who
worked in retail, and her father,
a Harlem-based drama teacher,
aactor
ctor and writer.
Both
Both of them have great
personal
p ersonal style, Johnson
says of her parents, who
never married.
My mom is all about
jewelry, sumptuous fabrics,
textures and colors. She made
all of my clothes when I
was little, says Johnson,
who today, fresh from the
McQueen exhibition at
the Met, wears a mustard
skirt from John Paul
Gaultiers collection
for Target, a graphic
Pret-a-surf T-shirt and
Valentino bag.
But it was her fathers
love of sports that inspired
her to connect the fluidity of
clothing with the movement
on courts and fields.
I was always a tomboy in
that way. You see how tall I
am, exclaims Johnson as she
stretches her 6-foot frame,
revealing an impressive wing-
span and sinewy arms.
I played street football
and could jump higher than
the boys. As long as I could
catch that ball, I was good,
she says. Ironically, the
limber beauty never played
basketballor any organized
sports, for that matter.
Johnson graduated from
Florida A&M with a teaching
degree, but entered the work-
ing world with an admin gig
at Essence, where she fell into
a social crowd of stylists who
worked with musicians such as
Mary J. Blige and Usher.
I was a natural, Johnson
says. After five years of learn-
ing the ropes while styling
music videos and the moguls
making them, she had a Rolo-
dex full of high rollers such as
Pharrell Williams, P. Diddy and
Jay-Z.
But when a friend of hers
at the music label Def Jam in-
troduced her to Chicago Bulls
guard Jalen Rose, her styling
career took an unexpected
turn toward sports.
tu
These [NBA] guys were
STYLED BY EMMA PRITCHARD FOR BA REPS, ASSISTED BY EMILY JENKINS; HAIR BY MONIQUE MITCHELL FOR HAIR RULES SALON NY;
wearing what their dads
we
and grandfathers were
wearing. It was bad
we
style being passed
down from genera-
do
MAKEUP BY JANE CHOI FOR MAC AT STOCKLAND MARTEL. KEVIN MAZUR/GETTY IMAGES FOR COND NAST.
tion to generation.
I was like, this could
be something. I love
sports. So I targeted the
NBA, says Johnson, grinning.
For eight months she tire-
lessly pitched sports agents,
trying to convince them she
was a necessary component
in the life and style of a ball
player. It wasnt until 2005,
when Johnson strolled past
Jay-Zs office at Def Jam that
the two worlds finally con-
nected. Jay-Z was meeting
with LeBron James manager,
Maverick Carter, to discuss a
stylist for the hoops prodigy
and called Johnson in.
[Jay-Z] was like, I want to
introduce you to someone,
in
8/29/11 5:19:38 PM

After Johnson signed
LeBron James, he
appeared on Vogue.
Johnson recalls. Hes like,
This is the stylist you need.
Its all who you knowand he
was that stamp of approval.
A few months after James
brought Johnson into his cote-
rie, NBA commissioner David
Stern enforced a business-
casual dress code for all league
playersgiving her business
plan an unexpected boost.
Sterns edict was a direct
assault on the NBAs culture,
which by the 90s had become
heavily entrenched in the hip-
hop world, where bigger was
unabashedly better. A taste for
do rags, baggy jeans, oversize
jerseys and huge pieces of bling
by Jacob the Jeweler were sta-
tus symbols. Tailored, classic
pieces were not.
There are different uni-
forms for different occasions,
Stern told ESPN. Theres the
uniform you wear on the court,
theres the uniform you wear
when you are on business,
theres the uniform you might
wear on your downtime...Were
just changing the definition of
the uniform that you wear when
you are on NBA business.
Some players, like Sixers
shooting guard Allen Iverson,
famed for his tattoos and corn-
rows, openly griped about the
new policy, but other players
saw it as an opportunity to beat
60 nypost.com/pagesixmag
PSM_R_JOHNSON6.indd 3
each other off the court too.
It became a huge contest
to see who could be the best
dressed, Johnson says.
She capitalized on this
appetite for competition by
turning hardball phenoms
such as 26-year-old star
LeBron James into unlikely
fashion darlings. For events
like his MVP reception in
2010, she outfitted him in tai-
lored Ralph Lauren suits and
custom basics from under-
stated French brand APC.
The streamlining of James
aesthetic paid dividends when
he appeared on Vogues April
2008 cover dribbling a basket-
ball while clutching super-
model Gisele Bndchen.
Nicole Miller
gown, $1,100,
77 Greene
Gre St.
Stuart Weitzman
Steel slingbacks,
St
$355, Stuart
$35
Weitzman stores.
AllSaints Veneza
earrings, $75,
us.allsaints.com.
When I saw LeBrons
Whe
[Vogue] cover, I cried,
Johnson says. He was there
too, and I was like, Do you un-
derstand what this means? Do
you know how hard I worked
for this? It gives me a sense
of accomplishment, she says
with satisfaction, crossing her
legs and resting her hands in
her lap.
James, for his part, is thrilled
with the results. Rachel and
I are a team, he tells Page Six
Magazine. We have worked
hand-in-hand during the evo-
lution of my image and style.
Johnson pauses to recall the
rejections she initially received
when she started out, then
raises her voice emphatically:
They would not pay me any
attention, girl. Now theyre
knocking down my door!
Indeed, Calvin Klein, Tom
Ford, Gucci, you name it, are
all happy to lend looks to John-
son for her A-list clientele. In
fact, brands like Rag and Bone
even custom-make suits just
for her non-sample-size
devotees. Doing so requires
devo
at least
l a three-week
turnaroundand adds a 30
turn
percent markup to an already
extravagant price tagbut
her following is willing to be
patient and pay up.
There is no question. All
of her players are the best
dressed in the NBA, crows
Stoudemire, a client for the
past three years.
But perhaps the best
endorsement of John-
sons impact on the
industry came at the 2011
NBA draft on June 23.
Until then, nothing exempli-
fied the dismal state of the
players poor fashion sense
more than the yearly selec-
tion spectacular, which often
resembled an annual Steve
Harvey look-alike contest.
But this year, from the front
row of Newarks Prudential
Center, Johnson watched
as a parade of newly minted
millionaires approached the
stage as if it were a catwalk.
Seventeen of the 20 towering
athletes swaggered toward
their new team owners in
sharp, frame-hugging suits
from labels like Joseph Abboud
and Ermenegildo Zegna.
Im like, whats going on
here? says Johnson, recalling
the event. I felt like the play-
ers were influenced by modern
ANNIE LEIBOVITZ/VOGUE/AP
mens fashion instead of their
dads local tailor. They finally
got the memo.
Signed, sealed and delivered
from one Ms. Johnson.
8/29/11 5:20:27 PM