Fashion Book Friday: How to Build a Fashion Icon by Law Roach

 How to Build a Fashion Icon:

Notes on Confidence from the World's Only Image Architect

 By Law Roach

Law Roach—the Chicago-born, psych-savvy "image architect" behind Zendaya, Celine Dion, Anya Taylor-Joy, Hunter Schafer, and more—brings us his debut book, How to Build a Fashion Icon: Notes on Confidence from the World's Only Image Architect. It's part memoir, part styling guide, and wholly a love letter to confidence, queerness, and self-expression

How to Build a Fashion Icon is a likely choice for a queer fashion writer who is reccomending books to read. How I became aware of the "fashion icon" Law Roach, I can't recall. He was all of a sudden everywhere in my world of media consumption; my algorithm must have been set to queer fashion content.

If you have ever seen the TV series Pose starring Billy Porter or the epic cult film Paris is Burning, you are aware of ballroom culture ( if you haven't watched them, stop now and go and stream them; it will open your eyes). I bring this up because Law Roach starred as a judge in the ballroom show Legendary, and he shone bright! His personality and his demeanour made him a star. In the audio version of this book, you get a real insight into Law's vibrant personality. He speaks in the book about how, at a young age, he had a gay voice, not an affliction to be treated but to be celebrated. I also was an effeminate boy with a gay voice, and I am now a slightly less effeminate gay man with a similarly gay voice—Law's description of himself as a child won me over. And listening to him read the book was an absolute delight. Therefore, I do highly recommend the audio version of this book.

How to Build a Fashion Icon

Where It Misses a Beat: Stylish but Surface-Level

A Little Too "Self-Help Instagram" at Times

Here's where my fashion brain did a little wobble. For a book with the word fashion in the title, it sometimes reads more like a self-empowerment workbook. Yes, there are tips, tricks, and heartfelt lessons, but if you're hoping for styling details that are about balancing a look or a guide on how to build a career as a stylist, this isn't it.

At times, the prose leans heavily into affirmations—"confidence is a choice", "wear what you love", etc.—without the kind of specificity I crave from a fashion insider. I don't need a bullet journal prompt; I need to know what it's like to check the look of a superstar walking into the Met Gala.

The Myth of the "Architect”

Also worth noting: Law refers to himself (as he has always done) as an "image architect." It's a phrase that's simultaneously powerful and a little nebulous. In the book, he defines it, but it doesn't quite land the way it could. I was hoping for a clearer breakdown of his methodology. What makes him an architect rather than just a stylist? Where's the blueprint? The elevation plan? Or even the demolition manual? I want the goods on why this stylist is, in fact, an image architect.