At the most premier concerts around the world, Nigerian artists are proving that fashion and music cannot be divorced. The platform has now moved beyond being a performance stage; it has also become a catwalk on which international luxury, fashion-forward style, and identity collide. While the noise may lead the crowd in, the visual is what lingers long after the lights come on.
As Burna Boy filled London Stadium with more than 60,000 individuals, his show was just as much about the style as the sound. He appeared in a burnt-orange Robert Wun suit, its fringes and pleats rippling through the spotlights. Later, at a different venue on the Love, Damini tour, he appeared in a sculptural black pleated design from the same designer. The outfits weren’t simply costumes; they were performance art, designed to sway with him, adding drama and depth to his presence. They made Burna Boy’s persona feel larger than life, an artist who is a spectacle as much as sound.
Tems has achieved the same thing, ensuring that her fashion reflects the power of her music. On London’s stage, she wore a teal Robert Wun gown of dramatic form and otherworldly line, clothes that gave size and majesty to her voice and movement on stage. At the Met Gala, she turned heads once more in yet another Wun creation, a gown which combined corseted black with imperial white fabric and skyscraper gloves. These choices place her firmly at the centre of the global fashion discourse, cementing the reality that Nigerian celebrities are not merely performing on catwalks but also setting music’s visual lexicon worldwide.
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Ayra Starr is one of a fresh batch of artists who see fashion as integral to performance. In her recent performance with Coldplay, she transformed looks during the concert, from leather pants and backup dancers in coordinating star-print tops to a cowboy-chic look complete with a cowboy hat, gold trimmings, and knee-high boots. Each outfit created a different vibe, highlighting her status as one of Afrobeats’ boldest young stars. She caused headlines at the Meta concert in Lagos in a daring outfit featuring a cropped top and boots, which sparked controversy on social media. Ayra Starr’s fashion is more than stagewear for her; it’s part of her bold, firebrand persona.
Stage fashion has taken a significant step forward for Rema. When he debuted his sold-out show at the O2 Arena in London, his entrance was theatrical. He rode into the space in a flowing black robe and red mask on horseback, an Edo and Bini cultural source look. He returned in a red and black getup, riding on top of a giant bat prop whose eyes were glowing red. These were not just gaudy costumes but carefully crafted cultural declarations. They blended tradition, myth, and spectacle, and in doing so, made him both a global superstar and a defender of local identity.
Afrobeats‘ biggest personality, Davido, also achieved a greater concert style. On his O2 Arena show, he wore a hand-beaded Okunoren jacket, the Iyami Eleye Jacket, which was designed as a tribute to the divine feminine. During his Brooklyn stop on his 5IVE Tour, he made a dramatic entrance in a large, golden-brown fur coat, which swept the web. For his Timeless Concert in Lagos, he turned up in a series of specially designed outfits by Nigerian fashion designers, including an all-white outfit and a pearl-embellished asymmetrical crop top paired with fitted trousers. His fashion, like his music, has become an anthem for identity and self-confidence.
These choices all show how fashion has been choreographed into the concert beat. A coat tossed on during the middle of a song, an article yanked away from diminished lighting, a heroic embellishment unfurled with a refrain, these are now as integral to the proceedings as the setlist. One no longer attends merely to hear. One attends to see something, a picture in paint with fabric, silhouette, and movement.
What comes into perspective is an extension of the shift in how Nigerian designers engage the world. They are not just dressing fashion; they are coalescing with it, utilising it to project themselves. The clothing is no longer separated from the performance. It is a continuation of the performance, as much a part of the memory of a concert as the music itself.
