Imagine if you will.

It’s Friday afternoon, and the streets are a blaze of black. The glitterati city slicker photographers stand in a perfect 180° on the subway platforms, like a line of a coke a mirror shard. Staring through plated glass, fashionistas copulate wordplay of their favorite obsession. Its was that time of the year again, New York’s Fashion’s Night Out and most importantly, its fashion’s night out. Rule of thumb, wear something black… or black-like.

Sean “Diddy” Combs blasts party crunk jams on a sight-seeing bus through 34^th Street, his Sean John insignia below his B&W Herb Ritts-inspired mug in a white tuxedo on the side. Sexy women in skimpy outfits dance as spectators take pictures from the sidewalks of the assiduous fashion Mecca. Rock band Train tunes their guitars and rocks out to their signature jingles like “Soul Sister” at a Tommy Hilfiger tailgate soiree. And despite the saturated Technicolor of fabric swimming in the wind and neon lights swirling amidst the night air, it’s like a neo-cosmopolitan funeral for club kids and nu-vogue wild wunderkinds.

The second annual credit card chewing monster extravaganza involving 1,200 retail galas around the megacity began with rendezvous at Macy’s. Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour, designers Michael Kors and Rachel Roy, performer Jennifer Lopez, and actor Neil Patrick Harris were among the millions of shoppers. There were others all over the city: Magic was made with a performance by turntable gizmos N.E.R.D. and a surprise pop-and-lock cameo by former R&B poster boy Chris Brown and a warped recital by the cast of the Broadway musical “Hair.” Not to mention, there were tons of celebrity appearances by Michael Bloomberg, Serena Williams, Metric, Tyrese and Ludacris, producer Ryan Leslie and Japanese designer Nigo to name a few.

It was a grand ole time in the city and here are some trends we’d expect to see in this fall:

Tailored Suits

The Ultramodern Military Jacket

Camel and Sequined Jeggings (however, not together)

Velvet Suits

Tailored Denim

Combat Boots

Plaids

Orange

Monk Straps

Flannels & Stripes

Dapper Debonair

Leather

Beyonce Wigs Out During New York Fashion Week [PHOTOS]

Nicki Minaj Comes “Out” For Magazine [PHOTOS]

Pharrell’s , waistcoat, tie, shirt combo is very versatile. You can dress it up with smart trousers and shoes or dress it down like he did at the Louis Vuitton party,  with some dark jeans.

Pharrell has inevitably gone for high fashion in Louis Vuitton, but if the LV brand is to pricey for your wallet, see below to get look for less.

Let’s start with the shirt. He’s is wearing a classic fit, pink and white striped shirt, which can be found at the Gap for $45

Not sure if N.E.R.D’s front man is wearing Vuitton denim, but  you can find a pair of casual raw denim almost anywear.  These smart regular slim fit Levi’s 505 jeans can be found at macys.com for $30.

Ok… I know this isn’t a Louis Vuitton buckle belt but it still adds edge to the look. Eagle buckle belt can be found at riverisland.com for $30.

Pharrell’s waistcoat has the classic Louis Vuitton tweed design, a look unique to the brand and unable to duplicate. However, Topman carries a great alternative for $60.

When it comes to accessories I think you should add your own personal twist. If it were up to me I would stick to dark colors like Pharrell. Here are a few suggestions in gallery below.

See more of Pharrell’s style here.

The weather is breaking and my second favorite season  is right around the corner. Finally, we can ditch the wool parker for trench coats, leather jackets, blazers…well you get the point. Check out some of our favorite celebrities sporting season appropriate outerwear.

Pharrell Williams has always sought to brand himself as a renaissance man of sorts. He is a giant in hip-hop, R&B, funk, fashion and even furniture design. But now Pharrell is making a foray into the online networking world with Artst.com, a virtual gallery designed to offer creative people of all mediums a place to showcase their work and build. Pharrell, being the eclectic impresario he is, drew the idea from his reading on King Solomon’s temple, a sacred place that allowed its visitors to worship their own deities under one roof.

Invoking such a hallowed model certainly sets the bar high, but the site will only be as impressive as the ilk of those who choose to join. That said, the idea certainly has enormous potential. A first glance reveals everything from a fresh Latin-beat remix of Jay-Z’s “Roc Boys” to custom-painted Scientology shell toes and a camouflage cargo pillow. Of course there is also your standard bedroom dance routines and elementary graphics work, but such is the plight of a forum that welcomes everyone to share their work. Artst.com’s ability to rate each member’s pieces and search each medium by popularity may be the site’s saving grace. It’s definitely worth a visit.

-Lukas Brekke-Miesner

Out with the old and in with the new. It’s time to celebrate, pop champagne and ring in the New Year. Here is to a great ’08 and a fine ’09. HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! Now let’s get it cracking…and rock it out.

1. “Auld Lang Syne” by Aretha Franklin and Billy Preston

2. “Pop Champagne” by Ron Browz featuring Jim Jones

3. “New Years Day” by U2

4. “Party Up” by DMX

5. “Jam On It” by Newcleus

6. “The Beat Goes On” by Madonna featuring Pharrell Williams

7. “Hypnotize” by Biggie Smalls

8. “Rock Wit You” by Michael Jackson

9. “I Just Called to Say I Love You” by Stevie Wonder

Preppy, the classic and WASP style of dressing is making a comeback. And celebrities and fashion designers alike are getting their “old money” look on. In the ’80s when there was a financial boom and crisis, hip hop was in it’s infancy, crack was ruining American cities and the Cosby’s were cool, preppy was all the rage. Flash forward to this year and everything seems very familiar except the soundtrack in now T.I., Beyonce and M.I.A.. Imagine Kanye West appearing on “Gossip Girl” and you get the point. Black, bougie and powerful. Now, we even have the first Black President in U.S. history who went to the Ivy League both Columbia and Harvard. Here is a look at the return of the Prepster.

Sunglasses are one luxury that everyone can still afford. Here are eight fly celebs who’ve got it made in the shades.

Common is set to release his 8th solo album December 9th entitled Universal Mind Control. Hip-hop’s resident philosopher has a new futuristic sound. The album features Kanye West, Pharrel, Cee-Lo Green, Chester French, and Muhsinah Abdul-Karim; who all teamed up with the lyrical giant in efforts to control your brain with stimulating bars and electrifying beats. Along with the album Common has also launched his fan-friendly website called www.thinkcommon.com. The site will keep you up to date on any and everything Common. He also tries his hand at the blog game with some interesting posts that he’s been updating on a pretty regular basis. (Not like Kanye and his 10 posts a day but you have to start somewhere right?) All Common has to do now is write a book called “The Art of Rapping For Dummies” and sign it for Soulja Boy; Then his rap legacy will be complete.

Bilal Morris

It looks like the rap duo have taken a few pointers from Pharrell—minus his affinity for Rainbow Skittles color schemes—for the first release from their brand, Play Cloths.  The gear looks boutique-ready, but it remains to be seen if the moneymaking brothers on the corner will catch on. (Pics courtesy of Hypebeast.com)

John Legend is a soul music machine. The release of his new album, Evolver, marks the third set he’s released in four years. GIANTmag.com recently caught up with the incomparable Mr. Legend at its “Soul Power” shoot to talk “green lights,” his big screen debut and more.

GIANT: So, tell me about Evolver?

John Legend: The new album is almost done. I am finishing it now. I am really excited. I think it’s the best one yet. I think it has a really nice variety of all the things that I am feeling right now musically and stylistically. I am really proud of it. I think the distinguishing thing about it is that I think that people will be able to tell that I was having fun making it and that I was fun experimenting musically doing some things.

GIANT: When did you start recording this album?

JL: I started last November and I have been doing it off and on since then but I probably started doing concentrated work 2 or 3 months ago.

GIANT: You released Get Lifted two years ago. So, why did you decide to go back into the studio so quickly?

JL: As soon as I get off tour, I want to go back into the studio. So, that’s what I did. [laughs] I will probably do the same thing after this one. That’s what I like to do. I like to write, I like to work. And whenever I am away from it for a while I miss it because I don’t write while I am on tour. So, its always fun to get back in the studio and see what I can work with and see what new stuff the producers I work with can come up with. And just how we can flip it.

GIANT: OK, so what’s the message behind Evolver?

JL: I always got the sense that people wanted me to stay in a certain box or a certain style and I just want to send a message that it’s not going to be the same album every time. The sound is going to progress. I am going to experiment and I am going to have fun with it. I just want people to know that from the title.

GIANT: How did your first single, “Green Light” featuring Andre 3000, come about?

JL: Well, it’s funny because Rick Knowles and I wrote the song. Rick isn’t known for this kind of music. He’s written for Dido, so he’s more known as an adult contemporary pop/adult pop writer but we wrote a couple of midtempo songs and then he started playing this guitar groove and then made a drum beat to it and it made me write. The beat wasn’t great but it was good to write to. I gave the song to my A&R KP [Kiwan Prather]. He works with Malay, who ended up being the producer on the record. Malay took the song and did a remix of it-gave the song a new beat, which is the song people hear now. And then when we got done with it, there were was a space obviously for a rap as well as these spaces after the choruses and we let them be. Then we sent them over to Andre to see what he wanted to do with it. KP is from Atlanta and came up through LaFace, so he has known Andre since they were kids or teenagers. So he hit Andre up and asked if he wanted to get on this record because it would be perfect for you. Andre heard it, he loved it and he wanted to do it. And he blessed it, obviously.

GIANT: Do you have a lot of collabos on the album?

JL: Kanye is on it. Buju Banton is on it. Estelle is on it. And um, production from will.i.am, Pharrell wrote a song. Production by Trevor Horn, Devo Springsteen…

GIANT: Given you previous success, did you find that there were a lot of producers that you haven’t worked with before who wanted to work with you?

JL: Yeah, we get beats from everybody. I never turn a beat down. I listen to everything because you never know where inspiration will come from. Even if the beat doesn’t make the album, it may inspire you to write a song and then you change the beat later. So, I listen to anything from anybody but I tend to end up work with a lot of the same people because we have chemistry. Me and will have a lot of chemistry, and have worked really well together on the last three albums. He always ends up having some of my favorite songs on my album, so we worked together again. We recorded three really good songs together.

GIANT: You mentioned Estelle. She is the first artist you have released under your label. How has it been watching her success from an executive standpoint?

JL: I am really proud because I feel like I had a lot to do with it and I feel like she deserves it as well. So, on both levels from just my personal involvement I am proud and then because she as an artist deserved to be heard, I am really that she is being heard and that she is doing so well. It took a while over here for the single to blow up the way it finally has but it was worth the wait.

GIANT: What’s next from Home School?

JL: My brother, Vaughn Anthony. He’s coming out next year. We have been a little stagnant lately because I have been working on my album. But we’ll get back to work and make sure we put some product out soon.

GIANT: OK. So, as you know the piece we’re doing is on soul singers. So tell me what your definition of a soul singer.

JL: I think part of it is the feeling-what you convey with you voice. It’s the truth, the honesty and the heritage of where we come from. We all recognize our heritage musically, pay homage to it while also doing new things as well. It’s kind of undefinable but you know it when you hear it.

GIANT: Who are your favorite soul singers?

JL: My favorite soul singers are Marvin Gaye and Aretha Franklin, for different reasons. When I think of soul, I think of gospel too. Aretha’s gospel recordings are some of the best I have ever heard and are truly, truly soulful. The Amazing Grace Recordings. And Marvin Gaye, I always think of “Distant Lover” on that live recording where he’s going crazy and the crowd is going crazy… “Please, please, please” I’m yeah, that’s soul music.

GIANT: We can’t talk about soul without talking about Isaac Hayes. I know you just finished Soul Men, a movie with he and Bernie Mac.

JL: I wasn’t on the shoot with Isaac Hayes. I was only on the set a couple of days and I shot with Bernie and Sam. First of all, I was really sad about Bernie because I never met Isaac Hayes but I had met Bernie a few times. He was always so full of life and energy. He always lit up a room so it really struck me when he died. I couldn’t imagine someone with so much energy and life dying at such a young age. Isaac Hayes obviously had such an impact on music. His sound was so distinct; what he did with the Shaft soundtrack was incredible.

GIANT: Do you see yourselves following his footsteps and doing movie scores?

JL: Yeah, it could happen. I can’t imagine when I’ll do it. I feel like I go from album to tour to album to tour but at some point I will try to do something.

For more John Legend and the rest of the singers featured in “Soul Power,” click here to see the photo gallery!

And for even more “Soul Power,” click here to see the exclusive behind-the-scenes video!

The superproducer and style icon shows how he kicks back in an intimate cover shoot for GIANT.

Super-paid beatmaker Pharrell Williams has created some of the most memorable hits in pop music. Now ready with his solo debut, In My Mind, the style icon wonders to Joan Morgan if he’s ready to expose his inner visions to the world.

There is an inherent transience to cities by the sea that makes them both sexy and susceptible to illusion. Not lies per se, or malicious deceptions, but a gentle massaging of the truth, the kind that facilitates the crap people want to believe about themselves—and obscures what they’d prefer others not know. This makes Hibiscus Island, Florida, with its heady infusion of private exclusivity and new money, the perfect background for a music video. Especially one whose treatment probably read a little something like this: Multi-millionaire playboy romances racially non-descript (but if you had to guess, Brazilian) beauty poolside at his mansion by the ocean. Joined later on his boat by his homeboy (Kanye West!) and two skinny-ass model chicks in barely-there bikinis. A Rolls Royce! Ferrari! Multiple designer wardrobe changes! Cut to: Sean “Diddy” Combs, special music fashion mogul friend! Lots and lots of bling! Boys, beats, boats and bitches meets Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous…this could quickly lapse into cliché. That is if the video in question wasn’t Pharrell’s “Number One.”

Clichés, you see, require precedent. The meteoric rise of Pharrell Williams’s career has none. The man has been leaving his indelible size nine sneaker print on the ass cheek of popular culture for more than a decade. As the more visible half of the ubiquitous Neptunes (the production team responsible for every other banger in your iPod—that is unless you don’t really mess with Britney Spears, Gwen Stefani, Jay-Z, Janet Jackson, Snoop Dogg, Justin Timberlake, Ludacris, Busta Rhymes or TLC), one-third of the critically-acclaimed rock band N.E.R.D. and CEO of Star Trak (musical home to Kelis, Clipse, Robin Thicke and Slim Thug), Williams’s eclectic kitchen sink approach to production has literally altered the musical landscape.

An unabashed fashionista, Williams’s emergence as a style icon has been equally impressive. Of the man who made skateboard gear sexy, MTV’s style guru Coltrane Curtis says this: “Pharrell is the yin and yang of fashion. He can give you something real grimy—gold teeth, tattoo on his neck—but he can also give you a white button-up that’s so crispy and so grown man. He’s fly.”

“Fashion for Pharrell is a lifestyle,” adds celebrity stylist June Ambrose. “Clothing for him is like second skin. It’s like the early days of hip-hop when artists didn’t need stylists. He knows how to translate fashion.”

And turn his passion for it into profit. Williams’s two luxe apparel lines, Billionaire Boys Club and Ice Cream (including tees, jeans, sneakers, hoodies, varsity jackets), can be found at high-end retailers like Barneys and Union with price points that range from $90 to $900. “No rapper, let alone a man of color,” continues Coltrane, “has been able to create a luxury product that can sell across the board. Rocawear, Marc Ecko Collections and Sean John Blue all caught bricks, but BBC sold over $100,000 in product at the Union store in Los Angeles in one day. A hoodie is $425—it’s a piece of shit hoodie,” he laughs. “Screen-printed all over. No detail. No embroidery. But the margins on them make you want to cry when you think of how much money Pharrell must be making.”

The coup d’etats continue. Later today Williams will take a break from our interview to sign a multi-million-dollar contract to be the first ever male (and black) face for French fashion house Louis Vuitton.