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Rapper Lil Yachty is coming out with his own unisex nail polish line on May 21, CRETE, and fans can register online to be alerted of the first limited edition release. “If you find painting your nails is a way to show your creative side, or it’s an aesthetic that fits you,” he said in the press release, “you shouldn’t be judged for it. Outside opinions shouldn’t have an effect on your aesthetic and whatever you decide to do, and this line is a reflection of that.”
Yachty originally announced the line’s arrival in December, on the heels of 17-year-old Trevor Wilkinson’s suspension from Clyde High School in Texas for wearing nail polish. A TMZ reporter approached the rapper outside of LAX Airport at that time and asked him what he thought about Wilkinson’s situation. Yachty offered his support, then he mentioned he would be starting his own line in response to the matter. “It’s essentially unisex,” Yachty told TMX, “but I want it to be more focused on men to use it and be comfortable. Bruh, it’s 2020. It’s ’bout to be 2021. What are the barriers?”
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With increasing fluidity around gender norms and categorizations, male celebs like Harry Styles, Zac Efron, and Brooklyn Beckham are a few of the recent names that have decorated their digits with color. But the shift towards more urban personalities is a noteworthy one, with names like A$AP Rocky, Lil Nas X, and Bad Bunny rocking the trend, too. (In fact, A$AP Rocky has been known to wear nail polish often and expressed the sentiment to Vogue two years ago, “I feel like men should be able to do nail art without feeling feminine.”)
CRETE is the brainchild of Yachty and Kinetic Brands LLC, a cosmetics-focused incubator firm. Sign up at https://www.crete.co/ so you can be among the first to know of the drop for their inaugural collection, “Negatives 001.”
