RIRI'S WORLD

Exclusive: Rihanna’s 23-Year-Old Muse Sita Abellan Now Has Her Own Line Of Merch

A first look at the Instagram star’s first collection that was inspired by her own style icon Lil’ Kim.


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PVC dresses, towering platform heels, oddly shaped sunglasses, and dog collars are just a few items you’ll find in model/DJ turned Rihanna muse and social media star Sita Abellan’s closet. So it was no surprise when the 23-year-old debuted a capsule collection with LA-based streetwear brand Freak City, as well as her own line of merch last month at MADE Fashion Week in Los Angeles. Her collection, which launches today, is a collection of bikinis, oversized sweatshirts, accessories, and socks, which Abellan modeled herself poolside at a hotel in Los Angeles.

Sita Abellan modeling her camo bikini. Photography: Vincenzo Schioppa

“I named my line Techno Capitalism,” explains Abellan over the phone from London where she is currently vacationing (“I needed a break.”). “It’s a critique of the technology era, society, and the consumption of social media. You know, how everyone uses social media, and somehow it’s bad—but I also can’t say that because I work in it too.” If you scroll through Abellan’s page, you’ll find the lanky brunette donning electric blue eye shadow, wild bikini tops, fluorescent purple boots, and accoutrements she picked up from sex shops—which she’ll often wear with nothing else on. “I don’t know how to describe my style, it just comes to me,” she says. Her page is so outrageous, that when Rihanna came across it while trolling Instagram two years ago, she immediately casted Abellan in her “Bitch Better Have My Money” music video on the spot. “When Rihanna reached out I thought she was optioning me, but she wasn’t, she was actually casting me for the video without meeting me.” But the pop princess’s fascination didn’t stop there —Rihanna tapped Abellan to walk in her Fenty x Puma show a year later, and the two are still in touch.

Sita models her “Techno Capitalism” socks, with green snake heels. Photography: Vincenzo Schioppa

Sita Abellan in her snake choker and t-shirt. Photography: Vincenzo Schioppa

A few standout items in Abellan’s collection include a blue rhinestone-studded snake necklace, a neon camo bikini set with mesh top, and a fluorescent orange sweatshirt she’ll pair with socks that have “techno capitalism” displayed at the rim. “When I make pieces, I think more about me than anyone else,” she explains of her approach to designing the line. She says her greatest inspiration was rapper L’il Kim, who Abellan counts as her greatest style icon, and references Kim’s scantily-clad numbers she would wear in the early aughts as peak fashion. “[Lil Kim] would wear all of these crazy bikinis, and I was like fuck I need to make bikinis because I can’t find really cool swimwear.” But Abellan would agree, her line is not for the faint of heart. “I think [the clothes] are for girl who is a badass, someone who doesn’t care, and wears what she wants.”

Sita in her orange merch sweatshirt. Photography: Vincenzo Schioppa