When life gives you lemons. Rachel Roy seemingly outed herself as “Becky with the good hair” after Beyoncé’s new album, Lemonade, dropped on Saturday, April 23. Here’s what Us Weekly knows about the entire debacle, including the fashion designer’s past history with Jay Z, Bey and Solange Knowles.
Roy Interns at Rocawear
Roy started her career as an intern at Jay Z and cofounder Damon Dash‘s fashion label, Rocawear. During her stint, the burgeoning fashion talent made her way to the top and was named creative director of womenswear at the brand. Eventually, she fell in love with Dash.
In a September 2012 interview with Time, Roy recalled her experience and encouraged aspiring young designers to gain experience by interning at other labels. “Learning what you don’t like is really, really vital, and knowing eventually what you do like.”
Dash and Jay Z Part Ways as Business Partners
In 2004, Dash and Jay Z parted ways as business partners. In numerous interviews, Dash subsequently hinted that he and his former close friend had a big personal falling out.
“All we did is made a company together and sold the company and went and did other businesses,” Dash told The Global Grind in a 2013 interview of their once-burgeoning empire. “It was a business arrangement obviously.… Maybe what you might want to ask is about the friendship, what happened with that, but that’s more personal.”
Roy Marries Dash
In January 2005, Roy married Dash in Mexico. The two share two girls, Tallulah, 7, and Ava, 16. In a November 2014 interview with the Daily Beast, Roy shared what she looks for in a partner. “Definitely find someone who has shared values,” Roy reflected. “Really talk to them about what their values are, what their goals are, and how they wish to achieve those goals.”
Roy and Dash Divorce
In 2009, a year after their second daughter, Tallulah, was born, Roy filed for divorce from the mogul — and the two continued to battle over custody of their girls through 2015.
Solange Accompanies Roy to the 2012 Met Gala
In 2012, Bey’s younger sister accompanied the fashion designer to Anna Wintour‘s star-studded annual gala in NYC. For the occasion, Solange donned a canary peplum design by Roy to help honor the theme, Schiaparelli and Prada: Impossible Conversations, and the old friends even posed and smiled together on the red carpet.
A week after Beyoncé, Jay Z and Solange attended the 2014 Met Gala, shocking surveillance video from an elevator at a Met Gala afterparty leaked, which showed Solange attacking the hip-hop mogul in the private, closed quarters. The video was taken after the trio attended a Met Gala afterparty at the Boom Boom Room in NYC in May 2014.
While Solange screamed at her brother-in-law and eventually lunged at him, throwing kicks and punches, her big sister, Beyoncé, side-stepped the altercation and watched everything go down from the other side of the elevator. One of the guards then grabbed Solange to subdue her from continually attacking Jay. Rumors circulated that Solange and Roy had an argument moments before the incident; unconfirmed reports have romantically linked Jay Z and Roy.
Beyoncé Makes Some Lemonade
The singer dropped her brand-new album, Lemonade, on April 23, 2016, and one of the songs, “Sorry,” included some provocative lyrics about a cheating man and his other woman. In it, she chants: “Middle fingers up, put them hands high. Wave it in his face, tell him, boy, bye … I ain’t thinking ’bout you!” She concludes by saying, “He better call Becky with the good hair.”
The designer posted a photo of herself with a friend the same night that Beyoncé dropped her new album, and alluded to her possible affair with Jay. “Good hair don’t care,” Roy wrote in the now-deleted caption. “But we will take good lighting, for selfies, or self truths, always. Live in the light. #NoDramaQueens.”
The Beyhive was ruthless. Roy eventually had to make her Instagram account private, though she tweeted about the scandal on Twitter. “I respect love, marriages, families and strength,” Roy wrote. “What shouldn’t be tolerated by anyone, no matter what, is bullying, of any kind.”
The designer was scheduled to appear at a NeueHouse event in NYC on Monday, April 25, but dropped out. “Due to a personal emergency, Rachel Roy has had to cancel this evening’s event,” an event rep told Us hours before she was scheduled to speak at the the creative conference. “Our apologies for any inconvenience.”
