At the 18th annual Harlem Fashion Row Fashion Show & Style Awards, Usher was honored with the Virgil Abloh Award.
During his acceptance speech, the R&B legend expressed his gratitude for his family.
“All of these people were significant parts of my ambition, Usher said. “They taught me to dream and run wild and use my imagination in fashion.”
He also thanked God for making him an entertainer.
“I recognize Him more than anything for saving me in my hardest moments,” he continued.
Usher then took time to thank his mother thanked his mother, Jonnetta Patton, for her unwavering support.
“I was really searching for identity. My dad gave [me his] name, but he didn’t show me what to do with it. So I had to define it in the way that I thought would make it matter,” Usher noted.
The “Confessions” singer spoke about the 3% rule that he adopted from Abloh that changed his life.
This idea that innovation really starts by altering something that is familiar [by] 3%. So that right there became kind of a model for how I would view how I was introducing [my art] again, but I introduced it with what many of people on my team call my ambition of just looking up,” he said. “While they look right and left and always have my best interest and my back, I just dream and think of something that I think is a little better.”
Usher also referenced Abloh’s most famous quotes.
“The world produces waves: You surf, you drown, you decide. Everything that you do is for that 17-year-old version of yourself.”
Before concluding, he shared what he would say to his 17-year-old self.
“That 17-year-old version of myself is the same thing that encourages me to this day, to make me fearless,” he said.