Musicians are taking on new roles as fashion icons by linking up with major brands to create innovative and daring new styles.

Rihanna initiated the trend when she joined Puma as their new creative director in late 2014.

“Creepers,” by Rihanna, became a must-have shoe that was far too difficult to get your hands on.

The shoe sold out online within a mere few hours, causing fans to go into an uproar because the release dates and restocks are few and far between.

“I wanted to take Puma to a new place with something unpredictable and unexpected,” Rihanna said in the mission statement on the Puma website.

The shoe was originally designed by the Los Angeles based brand “Mr. Completely” for Adidas as a limited-edition product. Rihanna was spotted sporting the sneakers more than once before the craze for them transpired.

Billy Walsh, a partner with “Mr. Completely” and stylist for music artist The Weeknd told Vanity Fair’s Amirah Mercer in a May 2016 article that he believed in the shoe from day one. “We started sending her these pairs (Adidas creepers), and she started buying them from us,” Walsh said. “And then, they asked me if I could do a Puma.”

Thus came the birth of the Rihanna Creeper that changed the demographic of fashion.

The shoe’s chunky sole and atypical color ways made them vastly popular.

Teenagers and their parents raved over the shoe in an attempt to get their hands on the new “it item.” “This is when the culture is combining. Like the ASAP kids, all that stuff.

“All the fashion kids of hip-hop were basically mashing up with this old British punk thing,” Walsh said.

Other brands like Hood by Air, a ghetto Goth themed label mentioned in last week’s trend section, were on the rise as hip-hop and British punk began to merge to dawn a new era in the fashion industry.

Pushing the limits even further, Rihanna linked up with Puma yet again for the release of her “Fenty’s” named after her brilliant last name.

She added flair to the traditional open-toe athletic slides that popular active-wear brands like Nike and Adidas had already produced. “Fenty’s” have fur covering the top of the foot allowing them to integrate perfectly with the fur wave of 2016 fashion.

A restock of the $140 “Creepers” is underway in just a few weeks. Another musician that made his mark in the fashion industry is singer-songwriter and producer Pharrell Williams.

The self-proclaimed sportswear fanatic collaborated with Adidas for a series of sneakers including remakes of the Adidas original shell toe sneaker better known as the “Superstar” that were first manufactured in 1969.

Pharrell sat down to speak with Alec Banks of highsnobiety.com about his work with Adidas.

“We’ve had a really wonderful relationship. We push each other. We learn from each other. And we benefit from the service to push and advance the culture forward in whatever ways we can. We try to communicate that through our campaigns and the actual product and through the kind of messages that we put out. That’s our main focus,” Williams said.

Williams said his collaboration with Adidas is a direct representation of diversity, equality and overall creativity. He said featuring models of color in his “Pink Beach” lookbook with Adidas was a top priority.

“If you look at the logo I have with adidas, the logo is two yellow lines. It’s for equality and those yellow lines are like street lines because we have a long way to go. So for me, I just want to continue to do things like this because it’s what is right.

And the crazy thing is, it’s probably one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen,” Williams said.

Williams debuted a new Adidas NMD sneaker called “Human Race” on July 22 of this year.

The yellow, black and white unisex shoe featured a new lace up pattern taking up only the top portion of the shoe leaving the majority of the sneaker free from restriction, allowing breathable space for the foot. A new wave of fashion has emerged with creative inspiration stemming from musical genres, artists’ personal styles and musically driven visions.

Qoutes courtesy of us.puma.com, vanityfair.com, and highsnobiety.com.

Thaija Evans can be reached at 581-2812 or tvevans@eiu.edu.