“I love just the loud colors of my clothes. It makes me feel seen, especially as a young girl traversing so many new spaces.”
For Yara Shahidi, Style Right Now Is All About Color, Confidence, and a Great Trouser
Self-care comes in many forms. And for Yara Shahidi, it's an ever-evolving process. “It starts with the simple things,” the actor and activist tells Glamour. “I love my morning time routine, and not just because I love the way it makes me look. It's the first moment in the day in which I'm starting by taking time for myself.” To that end, her nighttime routine is equally as important. “It's my last touch point in the day,” she says. “No matter how busy it's been, I'm spending time with myself winding down.”
Busy is right. The Grown-ish and Black-ish star is currently balancing her robust acting career—she's the next Tinker Bell!—with another semester at Harvard and a new multiyear partnership with Dell XPS that includes a creative campaign as well as a collaboration with Ghetto Film School, an award-winning nonprofit that aims to “educate, develop, and celebrate the next generation of great storytellers.”
It's a full plate—but Shahidi is someone who thinks big picture. “I'm trying to figure out how I want my schedule to look, and I think this is something for so many young adults,” she says. “It's more common now than ever to be juggling many things. One thing that I've been doing recently that has been really helpful is taking time to think about what dream of dreams would look like for me? And then seeing ways in which I could make it happen. That moment of affirming and setting time aside to not be reactionary to what's happening around me, but to be proactive, has been really helpful.”
How else is Yara Shahidi prioritizing her time? Find out in our latest installment of Your Fave's Faves.
The last thing I bought
I bought my brother a Brightech Sky LED lamp for his dorm, because he is a sophomore in college. It's one of those that faces upward so that it uses the other walls to create kind of a bounce light effect. I 10 out of 10 recommend.
Brightech Sky LED Floor Lamp
$59.99AmazonMy favorite way to spend a day off
My favorite way to spend a day off is with family. We really do love each other and probably enjoy each other too much. We love to travel as a family, whether it be a trip where all we're doing is sitting and being next to each other, or it's a trip where we learn history and go on little mini adventures. Smaller things, when we don't get to just get on a plane and get away, would be listening to podcasts. I recommend Heavyweight—there's a new season!—Being Seen, Dead Eyes, and Everytown.
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The best thing in my closet
My personal style is ever evolving in that I feel like I have very distinctive eras. There used to be a time where I did not, could not, stand jeans, but I loved high-tops. So as a little kid, I was in skirts and high-top tennis shoes. In my all-girls Catholic-school phase, I took the assignment seriously. I had knee-high socks, the plaid skirts, both in and out of school. And now a lot of this phase has been about finding pieces that help further my self-expression, which means I have a much wider dress code.
I love a good tracksuit. One year of school all I wore were different monochrome tracksuits for every day. But now, whether you've seen me on the red carpet—let's say in that beautiful green dress that my Dior family made for me—or you've seen me in my regular street style, I love just the loud colors of my clothes. It makes me feel seen, especially as a young girl traversing so many new spaces. Often have my clothes helped give me confidence before I get to that space of being confident.
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With my back-to-school wardrobe, I was challenging myself this year to not just wear tracksuits, which is harder than it sounds. You'd have to see my closet to understand how difficult that task is. But it has been fun dealing with sweaters and things that you get to do when you're not in L.A. and have more than one season. I'm a big trouser person. I've replaced the track pants with a great black trouser of different kinds and then trading out the tops. I've been leaning more into vintage and thrifted as well to fill out my closet and to find some really unique pieces.
How I sleep at night
Sleeping is the easiest thing I can do. It's a skill set of mine. I wish I could share my secrets, or that I had secrets, but I can fall asleep at any given moment in the day, even if I have lots of energy. I used to get nightmares, but I realized that was because I was listening to politics podcasts before I went to bed. So a lot of it has been about changing what I'm intaking immediately before bed. I know in a social media age, it's even more important do that because you don't even realize what images you're going to bed with in your head that are ruminating.
My go-to snacks
Apples, peanut butter, and chocolate chips has been me and mommy's favorite snack forever. My middle brother is allergic to all nuts, so now that I am safely not in a space with him I can eat that guilt-free and feel confident that he is still safe and protected. I also love Yerba Mate, because it looks like a healthy energy drink. I know that it probably isn't, but I do not feel bad when I drink it for a little extra energy kick. I'm also big on lots of fruit, lots of nectarines. I'm a big bell pepper person. I can down a full orange bell pepper with a little lime and salt.
Guayaki Yerba Mate, Pack of 12
$33.48AmazonThe best app on my phone
The best app would have to be Milanote. It's my mood-board app. I've been using it for some years now because so many of my collaborations require some sort of creative output and visualization of how we want something to look. Milanote has been the easiest way for me to put all of that together and send to people. I've loved what I've been able to do since I found that.
The last great thing I read
I've been reading lots of essays. A good one is by Herbert Cole called “I Won't Learn From You!” It's talking about the experience of an educator who has a student who's intentionally choosing not to learn from this teacher. But all in all, long story short, it's a really interesting conversation on the way in which race plays into our education and what it's like to be a part of a system that is not seeing you or recognizing you. It's really well written.
Anna Moeslein is the deputy editor at Glamour.
This story originally appeared on: Glamour - Author:Condé Nast
