Women in Music Proved Lots of Volume and Color Makes for Quite a Fun Red Carpet

While almost every award show red carpet brings with it fun looks and interesting conversations pieces, there’s just something about a music-based event that makes for some eye-catching fashion. While both actors and musicians like to look chic and on trend, musicians often also have the agenda of pushing the envelope. There’s a reason why, when Cardi B or Doja Cat host an award show, they come out in enough looks to fill a (very exciting) runway. So, it makes sense that when the women of the music industry came together on Wednesday night for the Billboard Women in Music event in Los Angeles, there were enough looks to satiate even the most ravenous of fashion appetites.

Some stayed in their wheelhouse, like Phoebe Bridgers, who has never met a Gucci suit she didn’t like. The singer—who took home the honor of 2022 Trailblazer—wore a butter yellow suit from the brand, with a stripe down the leg and an iridescent hem on the exaggerated collar. The real show-stopping moment came in the form of the under piece, however, a sort of beaded bib shirt in the same yellow hue, which resembles a skeleton’s ribcage, a common motif for Bridgers.

Olivia Rodrigo also stuck to her edgy Gen-Z aesthetic. Billboard’s Woman of the Year honoree wore a tiered white maxi dress from Area, with buckled straps and crystals lining the bustier. Rodrigo added some shape to the dress by belting it with a three-piece crystal belt, simultaneously adding some more edge and glamour to the look.

And then, of course, there were some garments taken straight off the runway. Doja Cat, who has quickly proved herself to be quite the fashion risk taker, snagged a dress from Wes Gordon’s fall/winter 2022 ready-to-wear collection for Carolina Herrera, which showed at New York Fashion Week just last month. The dress is a dynamic one, featuring an extremely low-cut neckline that continues right down to a giant bow. Underneath the bow erupts a ball of tulle, wrapped around Doja like a modern peplum. From there, comes a simple, column skirt, grounding the tulle in some reality and balancing the whole piece out.

Later, when accepting the Powerhouse Award, Doja added a bit of color to the night when she changed into a Barbie pink column dress, with a hood detail and voluminous sleeve attachments from Pierpaolo Piccioli’s Fall 2021 couture show for Valentino. The two dresses together provide a chic, monochrome story throughout the night, focused on volume in unexpected places.

Piccioli’s designs were represented well on the red carpet, as Saweetie also wore a Valentino look, albeit a much sexier one. The rapper opted for a flapper-esque dress the the Italian brand’s spring 2020 couture collection, with an almost completely sheer top and a beaded skirt made up of two panels.

The real color came from Tinashe, however, who stunned in a sleeveless polka-dotted Christopher John Rogers dress. Tinashe kept her styling simple to really let the ample skirt and eye-catching fabric have the moment they deserve.

The red carpet, though small, was enough to get one excited for the upcoming Grammy Awards, which were initially postponed, but will air on April 3rd. If this event was any indication, we can expect some exciting looks from the music industry’s finest when they step out next month for their biggest night of the year.