Its Nickis World

Perhaps it was the brightly coloured surgical mask that covered Nicki Minajs pout at the MTV Video Music Awards last August.

Listen to this article

Its Nickis World

00:00

1x 1.5x 1.8x

Perhaps it was the brightly coloured surgical mask that covered Nicki Minajs pout at the MTV Video Music Awards last August. Or maybe it was the neon puffball tunic ,which made her look as if shed fallen into a bowl of Dippin Dots,that she wore to Carolina Herreras spring 2012 show in September. But few in 2011 could take their eyes off Minaj,the Technicolour Barbie with the big voice and an elastic smile. Part sweet Lolita,part street-smart punk from Queens, Minaj has been the most talked-about young rapper to settle into the front row at New York Fashion Week since Marc Jacobs embraced Lil Kim as his muse in 2005. She is a sought-after cover girl,with spreads in Elle,Cosmopolitan and W.

A year ago,Minaj was making dresses for herself in her basement,said John Demsey,group president of Estée Lauder Companies,which owns MAC Cosmetics,the brand that worked with her on a lipstick. Now the others want to get their hands on her. Those others are companies hoping to get in the Nicki Minaj business. And business is booming,thanks in part to her behind-the-scenes moves. Like Lady Gaga before her,she wants to be a high priestess of style.

Some pop stars are born,others made,others spring fully formed from the Internet. Minaj,29,whose birth certificate reads Onika Tanya Maraj,moved from Saint James,Trinidad and Tobago,to Queens with her parents when she was 5.

Story continues below this ad

As a young girl she loved music and drama,which seemed like an escape from a chaotic home life; she told Details magazine in 2010 that her father tried to burn the familys Queens house down in an attempt to kill her mother. (Minaj declined to be interviewed for this article because,her publicist said,she was recording an album.) She attended LaGuardia High School of Music and Art and Performing Arts and in 2007 began releasing digital mixtapes,including Beam Me Up Scotty,in 2009,which was well received in hip-hop circles. In September 2010,two months before her album debut,Minaj and executives associated with her record label,Young Money Entertainment,asked to meet with Demsey of MAC. Minaj got right to the point: she wanted to be the companys Viva Glam spokeswoman. Shes funny,loves makeup and has a mashup style between Vivienne Westwood and a Harajuku girl, Demsey said.

But she wasnt yet a star,so Demsey proposed an online lipstick promotion over four Fridays,timed to her albums November release. On November 26,2010,MAC introduced Minajs Pink Friday lipstick,selling all 3,000 in stock in 15 minutes,in addition to an eye-popping 27,000 in the next three weeks.

As album sales took off (Pink Friday had its debut at No 2 on the Billboard 200),that brand began to expand. By early February,Minaj had sold more than 1 million albums,and fashion designers were beginning to take note. She was widely photographed prowling the red carpet at the Grammy Awards in a leopard-print bubble-skirted dress and matching leggings designed by Riccardo Tisci for Givenchy,and a Q-Tip shaped wig streaked with black.

In November,she appeared on the cover of W magazine. In the photo,taken by the artist Francesco Vezzoli, Minaj is dressed as the 18th-century French courtesan Comtesse du Barry,in an embroidered Dior couture gown.

Story continues below this ad

She was taken out of the cliché about rappers,that they are afraid to look like something else, said Stefano Tonchi,the editor of W.LAURA M HOLSON