Envied not just for her face card and body tea, but for a captivating personality and a refreshing groundedness, she has that rare kind of pull brands chase. From McDonald’s to Barbie to Hyundai, her successful portfolio of advertisements makes it clear: the girl can sell. That’s why one question looms: where is her brand? Olandria could push any product under the sun, so the absence of her own line has felt intentional. This week’s announcement of her first-ever product offering, a stunning purse produced in partnership with Brandon Blackwood, isn’t a random drop, but a deliberate start.

We’re in an era of inescapable celebrity brand launches. In haircare alone, we have Bey, Cardi, Taraji, Tracee Ellis Ross, even Issa Rae…. It’s overwhelming. Sexxy Red has (had?) her lip gloss, Nicki does sneakers and press-on nails (…), and Rih has built a brand empire I can hardly keep track of. As I write, more names come to mind: Rare Beauty, REM Beauty, Haus Labs, JLo Beauty, the Kardashian corporate multiverse. Who asked for all this? It’s enough.

The truth is, we’re all tired of celebrity brands. In a world full of talented but under-resourced entrepreneurs, the market feels oversaturated with merchandise pedaled by women who are indubitably talented, but whose expertise clearly lies in entertainment, not in product formulation. And to be honest, celebrity brand marketing just feels too fake to me. You have a personal trainer, a chef, a makeup artist, a stylist, and a hairdresser, but you want me to believe that your growth oil/ face serum/flat tummy tea is the reason you look like that while I look like this…okay.

My take is celebrity brands should not exist unless they hit three criteria: innovation, passion, and expertise. Anything else is a vanity project. Rihanna’s brand portfolio is the perfect example of how to do it right:

1. Innovation: Fenty Beauty pioneered the 40-shade standard for makeup lines, forcing the beauty industry to treat inclusivity as the baseline. Now, brown skin girls no longer have to wait for follow-up foundation launches.

2. Passion: Throughout her career, Rihanna has consistently pushed boundaries in beauty and fashion, treating personal style as a creative discipline rather than letting critics and convention dictate how she dressed.

3. Expertise: Rihanna’s huge portfolio of looks speaks for itself. Her long-standing, evolving relationship with fashion and beauty makes her authority feel earned rather than manufactured.

Rihanna’s empire represents what happens when celebrity branding is fully built out through innovation, passion, and expertise. But even when they work, celebrity beauty brands now feel like part of a crowded, predictable formula. The more interesting shift is happening elsewhere: in collaborations with established brands that already know how to make the product. That’s exactly what excites me about Olandria x Brandon Blackwood.

There’s no shortage of good beauty and fashion products on the market. There is a shortage of capital and access to promotion that affects the amazing brands that already exist. Olandria and Brandon are offering us a refreshing alternative to the traditional celebrity beauty brand model. The product itself, a pink pebbled leather purse, is hardly avant-garde, but we already live in a moment where novelty for novelty’s sake feels exhausted. What matters to us now is alignment: the who and the why behind the product, and whether it is anchored in something beyond visibility and capital gain.

This project stands out because we can tell it was designed with intention. It’s shaped by the existing relationship between Olandria and Brandon Blackwood, who first began working together in 2025. It’s rooted in a shared cultural grounding: Olandria’s HBCU pride, mutual engagement with Black uplift, and a consistent confrontation of anti-Blackness.

I hope it succeeds, because it feels like the kind of authentic, centered offering that consumers genuinely connect with. That’s where this model is more interesting than the standard celebrity launch. It’s not ownership for the sake of empire-building, but partnership with established brands that already understand craft, production, and longevity. It feels real.

And I hope this launch's success encourages other women of Olandria’s status to consider partnerships with established, culturally-significant enterprises. In addition to the celebrity brand epidemic, we’re at a critical moment for Black-owned businesses. These companies don’t lack quality product or leadership, but awareness and funding, and celebrities are in the position to contribute both to deserving businesses. As a fan and a consumer, that would mean more to me than another blatant money grab.

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Forget the CVS travel sewing kit. If you don’t know how to seriously stitch, you’ll look even worse for wear after fumbling around with dull needles and low-quality thread. My stylist kit has been meticulously composed over countless girls’ trips, nights out, and even a time or two on set working for some of pop culture’s brightest stars. This is my collection of easy-to-source items that you need to start carrying in your purse today to become everyone’s wardrobe savior.

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Lash Glue

Lash adhesive is a quiet little power move: skin-safe, invisible, and far more useful than it gets credit for. That curly fringe that needs to behave? A cowl neck threatening to betray you? Sunglasses sliding down your nose like they have somewhere else to be? A pendant that won’t stay lay forward? A few strategic dots, and suddenly everyone knows their place.

Lint Roller

There’s nothing chic about pet hair or lint on your clothing. It takes two seconds, babe. Get it together. They make ones small enough to fit in a clutch, so there’s no excuse for pulling up to the venue with someone’s dog on your outfit after a suspiciously fuzzy Uber ride. And no, they’re not just for hair. Lint rollers are also perfect for picking up fine powder spills—setting powder, I mean.

Stitch Gun

The coolest wardrobe tool that no one knows about: it’s like the fashion version of an office stapler. One click, and it fires a tiny plastic ‘stitch’ perfect for cuffing, tacking, hemming, locking things exactly where you want them. Where lash glue sticks clothes to your body, the stitch gun connects fabric to fabric. It’s for anything you’d trust to a safety pin, but better: pinning and draping up a long skirt, securing a blouse inside a waistband, anchoring a scarf so it doesn’t take flight in the breeze. Clean, fast, no fuss.

Micellar Water

Super easy to keep on hand, micellar water is the key for stain removal. Makeup, deodorant, pasta sauce, you name it: if you can spill it on your clothes, Ms. Micellar can get it out. Keep it on you with some cotton rounds or q-tips and you’re good to go.

Tampons

Because the supermodels on the front covers bleed just like us! On set, in the club, at the office - there’s always someone who needs one.

Embroidery Scissors

I recently found myself working last-minute wardrobe for a certain miniskirt-loving African pop princess…chopping a skirt with her hairstylist’s shears. Not my finest moment, but how I got there is a story for another time. My point is: I really really wished I had my ultra-sharp, fine-point scissors. It was technically a job for fabric shears, but in a pinch, embroidery scissors can get you through almost anything: snipping threads, removing tags, opening vents. Getting them through security? Questionable. But everything I’ve mentioned so far fits inside a manicure travel case. Try your luck.

Travel Steamer

The first and most important thing you learn how to do as a baby stylist is garment steaming. It’s easier and faster than a clothing iron, and it makes any outfit ultra fresh and crisp. Don’t let the runways fool you, the wrinkled clothes ‘trend’ is cute for them, not for you.

Emergency Earrings

Something about naked ears completely ruins a fit for me no matter how good everything else looks. It just gives unfinished. Set some spare neutral studs in your wallet or slide some baby hoops in your card holder. No earrings, no outfit!

Hem Tape

This is the emergency service no tailor wants you to know about. Too-long trousers dragging on pavement? A dress that gave “elegant floor length” in the mirror but “tripping hazard” in real life? Sorted. No sewing, no drama. Just peel, press, and pretend it was always meant to be that way. It won’t judge your decisions, and it definitely won’t ask questions about how last-minute they were.

Bandaids

We all fall for it at least a couple times - the shoe that is too cute to say no to, but diabolically uncomfortable to actually exist in for more than 15 minutes. Bandaids are too easy and too important not to have in your kit. Beyond blister-rescue, I’ve found quite a few ways to use them: in lieu of eyeliner tape to create the perfect black wing, as fingertip armour while handsewing, as lobe support for heavy earrings…the use case honestly might be endless.

A sewing kit is standard. A stylist kit is selective. If yours starts to feel like a junk drawer, you’ve missed the point.

There you have it: my secrets to keeping everyone around me looking polished and feeling confident. Proven useful for both high-pressure celebrity shoots and the mishaps of the quotidian.

Ready to build yours? I’ve done all the hard work for you: shop my faves here.