Super Power: Ciara's Strong Side

For this album, the follow-up to 2006’s “Ciara: The Evolution,” she enlisted celebrity stylist Mariel Haenn to work with her on videos, including “Go Girl” and “Love Sex Magic,” as well as for most press and other appearances. “I really wanted to try her,” Ciara says of Haenn (who also counts Rihanna as a client). “She’s young and she’s new and I felt she was on to some really cool things.”

This is a sentiment that’s also echoed in Ciara’s view of the fashion world and, in particular, emerging designers, whose looks she wears on these pages. “You know what?” she says, as if making the connection anew. “It’s almost like myself — I’m young and haven’t been doing this for a long, long time, so I relate [to young designers]. It’s cool to see them get opportunities to share their creative visions and to actually be successful at it.” And Ciara is certainly supporting fashion newbies at her WWD interview, dressed in a white tank, Current/Elliott skinny jeans and booties by 2009 CFDA Swarovski Award nominee Alejandro Ingelmo, all culled from her closet. “There is a lot of new energy and a lot of new ideas that these designers are bringing,” she says. “It’s also cool to know what’s coming, to kind of be on top of something in the early stages.”