Fashion over style
Anatolli Smith making his mark in global fashion and keeping JA at the centre of it all
Published:Sunday | December 22, 2024 | 12:10 AMOmar Tomlinson - Contributor
Deftly curating personality images, one chic garment at a time, fashion editor and stylist Anatolli Smith has built a solid reputation as an oft-called-upon name in international fashion.
The Jamaica-born, Big Apple resident is the creative eye behind the looks presented by this month’s Glamour UK cover stars, former Hollywood heirs-turned-multimillionaire entrepreneurs Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie.
“We shot this on September 23 at the Condé Nast building at One World Trade Center where Glamour has its offices,” Anatolli divulged of his latest assignment.
“The Glamour team initially reached out on September 4 to ask if I was available and interested. I was in Paris and planning to stay at least through the end of the month but told them I would be open to [coming] to New York for the shoot. They confirmed seven days later, giving me 12 days to prepare [and fly into New York] for the shoot. With the help of the Glamour marketing team and my team of assistants in New York, we prepared it. I flew in on the 22nd, shot on the 23rd, and flew back to Paris on the 24th for other jobs I had already committed to there,” revealed the frequent-flier stylist. He is fielding questions from The Sunday Gleaner on a set break in Los Angeles, where he is at work on an upcoming campaign for Good American — the body-positive womenswear fashion brand co-founded by media personality and businesswoman Khloe Kardashian — to shed light on his behind-the-scenes work with Hilton and Richie.
“They were both very collaborative throughout and great to work with. We had a call before the shoot where we talked a bit about what styles, colours, and silhouettes they thought worked well on them as well as what they didn’t really love to wear.”
Smith explained that the duo, who broke big in the pop culture Zeitgeist with their tongue-in-cheek TV reality show, The Simple Life in the early aughts “are lovers of fashion and risk-taking but are also obviously well aware of what their brand is and what works for them.”
“I took [my direction] from that call with them, the creative call I had with the team at the magazine and also spent some time watching old episodes of their [former FOX] TV show to craft my idea of what the fashion should look like.”
For the build-out of the Glamour editorial titled ‘Paris & Nicole Are Back and Mean Business’, he explained: “The magazine approached with a story for the video concept and script. My job was to put together looks that made sense for the scenarios they had in mind for the Glamour magazine takeover, and in a way, to reference some of the humour and glamour in the original Simple Life show but without losing the bosses both women had become today. So I went through the collections and found ideas that I could work [with] to satisfy the story, be photogenic, and have both talents feel excited to be wearing them and deliver.”
For the luxury ensembles shortlisted for the duo to be draped in, the stylist noted: “The Marc Jacobs pieces were a no-brainer for me. It was one of my favourite collections of the season. We also shot pieces from Ronald Van der Kemp, Mugler, Versace, Jacquemus, and Ferragamo. But we had so many more that would have been incredible. But for a shoot with celebrities, you typically only have so much time and have to prioritise the things that can be the most impactful in the time you have.”
An alum of Wolmer’s High School for Boys on Marescaux Road in St Andrew, Smith migrated to the United States in 2000. “I grew up in St Thomas and moved to Kingston while in high school. I left after sixth form to attend Columbia University in New York. It was a relatively easy transition for me. I have always been curious about people and culture and paid attention to the way people live and operate, so it’s very easy for me to move through new spaces.”
At Columbia, Smith enrolled in women’s and gender studies and international human rights. He then continued his educational pursuits at the Fashion Institute of Technology with a master’s programme in fashion and textile history.
Connecting the dots to the start of his current professional life, he reminisced: “I realise my styling career really started in Jamaica while in high school. I brought a group of high school students together in the 1990s to create a magazine for teenagers. The then editor of the Jamaica Observer, Paget deFreitas, heard of what we were doing and invited us to come and produce the same magazine idea for the Observer. I brought my team there, and we created TeenAge. It started as an eight-page section in the Tuesday paper under youth editor Vivienne Green-Evans, and eventually, at its height, was its own separate magazine pullout. I wrote and edited columns every week and recruited others to participate. One column I did weekly was a fashion column where I styled photo shoots and wrote articles about local designers and stores and fashion trends.”
Smith is appreciative of the legacy he left behind. “ TeenAge continued for years after I left Jamaica to go to university. I had always been very proud of that. That experience of creating weekly stories and shoots around clothes ignited my love for styling and image making, and I continued to find ways to pursue it through college and beyond.”
Post-college, he has only ever worked as a stylist and that’s just how he likes it.
“It’s really been a very long time,” he said, looking in the rear-view mirror of things past. “It became serious for me when I started interning and then assisting other hugely successful stylists to learn from them as a career. [They were] people who travelled the world, creating images for the magazines [that] I admired, styling shows and advertising campaigns for brands whose imagery and success I respected and worked with celebrities who seemed larger than life.”
His remarkable portfolio spans covers and editorials for Interview Magazine, Harper’s Bazaar, CR Fashion Book, Numéro, Modern Weekly China, and Cero Magazine. Smith is a fixture for top-tier designers’ seasonal fashion shows and presentations, with Adam Lippes and Derek Lam, among those for whom he has executed stylist duties.
For the then-fashion-adoring Jamaican teen who once dressed local models for photoshoots in pieces culled from the island’s boutiques, today, he is also a stylist on speed dial for celebrity clients. One such is legendary model, actress, and entrepreneur Brooke Shields, for whom he is a member of her glam squad and who he most recently dressed in a glittering gold vintage Vivienne Westwood gown for the 2024 Glamour Women of the Year Awards in New York City. “It’s an honour to work with someone who is such an icon, has worked with all the greats, been lensed by all the photographers I admire the most and is still such a curious, collaborative, and lovely person to work with.”
While Smith also resided in Paris and London for significant periods and currently has a fixed address in Greenwich Village, the tug of nostalgia still brings him to The Rock.
“I come back to Jamaica very often, sometimes a few times a year, for family, for leisure and for work,” he said. “Even though I haven’t lived full time in Jamaica for a long time, I still consider it home. I also feel like it’s my duty to use the access I have and whatever platform it gives me to collaborate with other Jamaican creatives and pass the mic when I can. Portland and Treasure Beach are among my favourite places to chill, but nothing can replace the decades-long friendships I have in Kingston.”
Responding to whether he trumpets his Jamaican roots in workspaces and elsewhere, the fashion editor, who hails from Dalvey, St Thomas, is unabashedly patriotic. “Yes, 100 per cent ... I have a huge sense of pride in my heritage and culture. I grew up around so much creativity and originality, sacrifice and ingenuity, brilliance and simplicity that no matter where I land in the world, I can walk into any space confident that no one is better than me and that I am better than no one. I am very clear about where I’m from and who I’m from, and I take it with me wherever I go.”
On tap for a return trip to the island next month, work duties will dominate his itinerary. “I’m coming in early January to shoot a major Jamaican icon for The Face magazine,” he shared.
As the clock ticks ever closer to Christmas Day, Smith’s holiday plans Stateside involve family time. He is set to escape the freezing temps for warmer climes: “My family moved to West Palm Beach, Florida, so I’ll head there to relax with them, eat some food, and spend quality time with my loved ones,” he shared while also revealing what is on his 2025 wishlist.
“[I would like] the release of all oppressed people around the world. More genuine kindness and love shown to people even when they don’t look and sound like us. And a lump sum of money for my family and friends.”