On Feb. 2, rap artist extraordinaire Doechii became the third Black woman to win a Grammy for Best Rap Album for her album Alligator Bites Never Heal.
Doechii’s historic night, which included out-of-this-world performances of hits from Alligator Bites Never Heal, including “Catfish” and “Denial Is a River.” This assembly of musical triumph was matched by what can only be described as a total sartorial takedown. Doechii’s style exists comfortably at the intersection of punked-up prep and the swamps of Tampa, where the alligator princess developed her invaluable sense of style that has propelled her into one of the brightest rap talents of the last 10 years, and you can absolutely quote me on that one.
This bayou blend of tailored suits and exaggerated silhouettes is a combined effort by Doechii, her stylist Sam Woolf, and the king of tonal suits himself Thom Browne. But she’s not just a stunner in suits; she can rock a plunging silhouette with equal prowess, as evidenced by her digital cover for The Cut’s Spring Fashion issue.
Her style isn’t just visually intriguing; it’s also delightfully subversive. From silky tech briefs from Miu Miu to bondage-tinged leather Off-White gowns, her fashion lands at the small crevice between the genuinely perplexing and the universally charismatic.
So yes, the clothes are good, but the bulk of Doechii’s transfixing aura is found within her makeup arsenal. She frequently explores the limits of color theory and incorporates obscure aesthetic elements like colored contacts and face tapes, which transcend the existing status-quo when it comes to Black beauty ideals.
On the whole, Doechii is not afraid to forsake conventional trends for the sake of a good gag, as we saw with her 2024 PAPER magazine shoot, in which she dressed as a ripped, mustached, 70s-flavored hunk. This embracement of a masculine figure strikes as especially endearing considering the current beauty standards in the rap industry, which demand women present as the sexiest and most desirable versions of themselves.
This is not to say she doesn’t dabble in the more conventional when it comes to Hollywood’s beauty standards. In fact, she’s admitted to getting a BBL and Botox among other things. So it’s not so much that she leans too far one way or another, but rather she repackages the phenotypes established by the women who have come before her and fuses them with her own defiant steez, resulting in a final product that captivates fans and haters alike.
