Rihanna Covers Harper’s Bazaar March 2025 Legacy Issue
Rihanna seemingly has it all, and now the mogul-turned-mom reveals what fans want to know most: How does she juggle everything and will we ever get another album? Like everything else about the Bad Gyal, the answer is complicated but exciting.
Source: Luis Alberto Rodriguez / Harper’s Bazaar
The Fenty founder opened up in a new interview about the evolution of her Fenty empire, family with A$AP Rocky, and identity as a music artist. As the new face of Dior J’adore perfume and rapidly expanding her own Fenty beauty, clothing, and hair lines, “booked and busy” is an understatement.
For the cover of the Harper’s Bazaar March 2025 Legacy Issue, Rihanna reflects on the career she’s built for 20 years and the unfinished business that keeps her relentlessly motivated for more. She also addresses rumors about her long-awaited new music and which of her previous albums she keeps on repeat.
In the cover photo, Rihanna’s flowing Dior dress provides an intimate peek that only adds to her towering strength, rather than compromising it. For each of the stunning pictures in her spread, she rocks head-to-toe Dior, complete with the flagship fragrance she learned to love from her mother, who sold perfume during Rihanna’s childhood.
“My first introduction to J’adore Dior was my mom. My mom used to sell perfume at a duty-free store, she said. “J’adore was one of those ones that were always there. And that’s where my love for J’adore started,” she shared about the historic role that initially “intimidated” her.
Source: Luis Alberto Rodriguez / Harper’s Bazaar
It’s hard to imagine Rihanna intimidated by anything. She didn’t start out that way when she left home at only 17, desperate to make it overseas in the U.S. She admits that back then she “had a lot of doubts,” but that only made her work harder.
“And I came to a big city by myself, and the only option for me was to win. I knew that I had to win. The suffering that I felt not being a part of anything that I knew, there was only one way to make that worth it, because I knew that my family was suffering without me too. And so I was like, ‘There’s no way. This has to pay off.’ And that was my fight, my goal, my everything. Every single day,” she says.
Read more about how Rihanna balances growing her family and businesses and what RZA and Riot are really like after the flip!
Rihanna Shares What Her Boys’ Personalities Are Like And How She Handles Mom Guilt For Time Spent Working
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As a mom of two, she pushes herself even harder even though she struggles to take time away from her children, RZA and Riot.
“Every decision I make revolves around them, but everything that I do that I love robs me from them,” she says. “So I have a weird resentment with the things that I love. You almost feel like something is always suffering for you to show up somewhere. And even when you show up there, it’s not 100 percent because there’s something else on the wheel. It’s actually given me a lot more self-guilt. I don’t like letting people down, but I also know that most of that is me letting myself down, which means something has to change, but everything is on the wheel at all times. I have to keep reminding myself that I asked for this, I love this,” she continued.
Source: Luis Alberto Rodriguez / Harper’s Bazaar
When it comes to her baby boys, the apples don’t fall far from the unapologetic tree. They’re so full of personality that they effortlessly own any room and their parents’ hearts. The 37-year-old and their devoted dad, Rocky clearly have their hands full.
“RZA is just an empath. He’s so magical. He loves music. He loves melody. He loves books. He loves water. Bath time, swimming, pool, beach, anything. And Riot, he’s just hilarious. When he wakes up, he starts to squeal, scream. Not in a crying way. He just wants to sing. And I’m like, ‘Okay, here we go!’ He’s my alarm in the morning! He’s not taking no for an answer from anyone. I don’t know where he came from, dude,” Rihanna joked.
Riot’s name came from Pharrell, who worked on a song by the same name with Rocky during her pregnancy in 2023. It didn’t take long for her youngest to live up to his rebellious name.
“Like all [new] siblings do, and at first Riot was understanding that his role was being the little brother. Now he knows he’s in charge,” she explained about his dynamic with RZA.
While her children’s personalities and voices emerge, Rihanna is redefining and reintroducing hers once again. The fashion icon discussed the compromises of finding her new style as a new mom. She still loves the thrill of risk-taking and feels that side of herself coming alive again after reconciling with parenting and post-partum changes.
The Fenty Empire Doesn’t Sleep, And Sometimes, Niether Does Rihanna
Source: Luis Alberto Rodriguez / Harper’s Bazaar
Although Rihanna found a new signature style to adapt to her growing family, business doesn’t wait. She took a virtual meeting days after becoming a mother. With Riot’s birth, “three days out of the hospital, I was in a meeting in person with a robe and a belly that looked like I was still pregnant.”
Some joke about the endless Fenty launches, but Rihanna stands on business and stands behind all of her products. “I care because my name is on it. I don’t want my name to represent anything that I didn’t stand for,” she said.
Her products may have taken over your bathroom counter, lingerie drawer, and closet, but Rihanna is plotting on the rest of your home. She has an eye on interior design and Fenty furniture in the future. The billionaire also dreams of creating a wine, but is patiently waiting to launch from a family vineyard.
The island icon never stops expanding, but that doesn’t mean she’s abandoned her roots as an artist.
Read about Rihanna’s new genre-defying music, which album of hers stays in rotation, and how she views her legacy after the flip
R9 Really Is Coming, But Rihanna Sets The Record Straight On Genre Rumors And Her Current Inspiration
Source: Luis Alberto Rodriguez / Harper’s Bazaar
Don’t worry, Navy! Rihanna doesn’t plan to retire from music just yet. Like the rest of us, there’s one album that still has her firmly in a chokehold and it’s Anti. She’s just like us! And her last studio album paved the way for what she’s cooking up now.
“I listen to Anti from top to bottom with no shame. I used to always have shame. I actually don’t like listening to my music, but Anti—I can listen to the album. It’s not me singing it, if I’m just listening to it. That’s the one album that I can have an out-of-body experience where it’s not like … You know when you hear your voice in a voicemail, and it’s like, ‘Ugh.’ ” The time with her music reinforced where she wants to take it next. “I think music is my freedom. I just came to that realization. I just cracked the code on what I really want to do for my next body of work.
As the diamond-selling diva looks to herself for direction, she’s cracking up at the theories about R9. She saw the theories about a reggae album in the works, but says no one can predict what she’ll do next. After all this time, she thinks intentional excellence that defies expectation is the least she can offer loyal fans.
“Way off! There’s no genre now. That’s why I waited. Every time, I was just like, ‘No, it’s not me. It’s not right. It’s not matching my growth. It’s not matching my evolution. I can’t do this. I can’t stand by this. I can’t perform this for a year on tour.’ After a while, I looked at it, and I was like, this much time away from music needs to count for the next thing everyone hears. It has to count. It has to matter. I have to show them the worth in the wait. I cannot put up anything mediocre. After waiting eight years, you might as well just wait some more,” she continued.
Source: Luis Alberto Rodriguez / Harper’s Bazaar
Nothing speaks to Rihanna’s commitment to authenticity like using her own artistry as a compass. She keeps it as real in the streets with Rocky as she does in the booth or her clapbacks online.
“We like to eat with people. We like to shop with people. We like to walk the streets with people. I don’t like a private room. I don’t have them shut down stores. I don’t like the Rapunzel life. It’s very isolating. It’s very lonely. And what am I protecting myself from? I’m actually allowing people to dictate the robbery of the life that I could actually be living,” she explained about her low-key adventures in Rocky’s NYC hometown.
With all that the legendary star has accomplished and works on behind the scenes, she never loses sight that the biggest gift is the present. Rihanna makes no mistake that she is living her legacy one epic moment at a time.
“My legacy is right now. That’s all I have the most control over. My legacy is what I do with my time at this moment. How am I present with the people around me? How am I grateful? How am I making this a happy moment? How am I making a memory? I’m even in the space of not even spending my money on things, but I’ll spend my money on an experience. That’s something no one can take from me. Somebody could rob me right now of everything I have, [but] they will never take a memory, an experience, a feeling, a scent that reminded me of that moment. There’s just things that mean more when you grow up.”
The Harper’s Bazaar March 2025 Legacy Issue hits newstands in the U.S. on March 4.
