The vibes in Kelsea Ballerini’s hotel suite are, as to be expected, excellent. The “Wicked” soundtrack is playing (followed by Beyoncé’s new track and “Lemonade” album), coupés of Champagne have been poured, and Ballerini is dancing in her bathrobe in a chair while gloss is applied to her lips.
The Nashville-based musician is in town for New York Fashion Week, on a two-stop tour that began with the Coach show Monday followed by Michael Kors on Tuesday afternoon. Kors holds a special place in Ballerini’s fashion journey, as it was the first fashion show she ever went to, in February 2020.
“I’m such a girlie girl. I love fashion, I love clothes and I love expressing myself and my style by how I feel. And I feel like Kors specifically is so good at being for every woman and being classic and approachable, but still having such an elevation to every look through every collection,” she says. “I mean, I’ve been to I think four shows now and every collection, I’m like, ‘I would wear that. My best friend would wear that, too.’ I can see every woman in my life wearing all these different pieces, and I think that’s why he’s such a classic.”
In the car on the way to the airport immediately following the show, Ballerini raves about the experience.
“It was beautiful. It was classic, everything Michael Kors — but also the soundtrack was all symphony Alicia Keys, which really added a beautiful vibe,” Ballerini says over the phone. “It was ‘No One,’ it was ‘Girl on Fire,’ and it was cool. He had it where it was mostly a symphony, but then every few lines in the song, she would come on and sing. So it was very specific and interesting.”
The front row gave her an opportunity to catch up with friends like Mickey Guyton, “my fellow country singer,” as well as Nina Dobrev and Rachel Zegler.
“I saw [her] across the room at the Time 100 event and didn’t get to say ‘hi’ to her, and [at Kors] we were a couple seats across from each other, and so we got to connect and just kind of fan girl and gush over each other’s voices, which was really sweet,” Ballerini says.
Once home in Nashville, Ballerini spends the rest of the week — including Valentine’s Day — in the studio, “just making sure the first round of the next set of songs is dialed in,” she says.
“Right before it comes out into the world is always the most high-pressure time, because writing it is so free — and then you put it in the studio and these musicians come in and the label heads come in and you’re about to put it out, and it’s not yours anymore because it’s everyone else’s. So it’s like the final exhale before it’s out there.
“It’s kind of intense, but kind of beautiful,” she says. “I’m excited.”
