Rihanna declared world's richest female musician
Rihanna has racked up a $600 million fortune to become the world's richest female musician.
NEW YORK (AFP) - Singer, makeup entrepreneur, lingerie designer and now the first black woman to head a top luxury fashion house -- Rihanna has racked up a $600 million fortune to become the world s richest female musician, Forbes said Tuesday.
The 31-year-old -- born Robyn Rihanna Fenty in Barbados -- has amassed wealth exceeding that of Madonna ($570 million), Celine Dion ($450 million) and Beyonce ($400 million), whose husband Jay-Z was just named the world s first billionaire rap star.
Rihanna s ranking puts into fresh perspective one of her signature lyrics -- "work, work, work, work, work," which opened her 2016 dancehall smash "Work."
Since bursting onto the scene in 2003, she has spun her triumphs in music into entrepreneurial gold, launching her makeup brand Fenty Beauty -- co-owned by French luxury giant LVMH -- in September 2017 online and with Sephora.
The line found success not least thanks to Rihanna s fame both on and offline, with some $570 million in revenue last year after just 15 months of business.
She makes the majority of her money from touring and musical releases, according to Forbes, but also co-owns her Savage X Fenty lingerie line.
In May, Rihanna launched a groundbreaking partnership with LVMH to launch a luxury fashion brand based in Paris that will make ready-to-wear clothes, shoes and accessories.
A new large-scale luxury label -- especially one led by a black woman -- is a huge development in the fashion world, with Rihanna s line Fenty sitting alongside legacy brands like Dior, Louis Vuitton, Fendi and Givenchy at the conglomerate headed by Bernard Arnault.
"I just want to see things from my perspective. I m a young black woman who loves and embraces all of the young people s ideas and energies -- I m so about that," she told AFP in Paris recently.
"It is about turning all of that into something luxurious for this fashion house."
The singer s explosive rise to music mega-star and global fashion icon did not come without tribulations, including her father s bids to profit off her name and a highly publicized domestic violence case that saw her then-boyfriend Chris Brown charged in 2009 with assaulting her.
In addition to her venture into luxury fashion, Rihanna has hinted at dropping a new reggae album this year.
"I never thought I d make this much money, so a number is not going to stop me from working," she told The New York Times T Magazine in May.
"Money is happening along the way, but I m working out of what I love to do, what I m passionate about."
