“There was a moment, seeing her laying on the couch in this crazy opulent house, wearing a Versace gown, and I had to pinch myself.” Hayley Louisa Brown is talking about photographing Kali Uchis for one of the covers of edition 5 of Brick, the hip hop-focused magazine for which she is the founder and editor-in-chief.

In conversation, Brown’s love for her work is contagious: “I’ve had a vision in my head of how I wanted to photograph Kali for almost five years, so I was incredibly excited that the stars finally aligned and we confirmed her for the cover.”

Joining the dreamy singer as cover stars for edition 5 of the magazine, which was released in the past week, are all American boyband Brockhampton, Grime legend D Double E, and Atlanta rapper 2 Chainz.

Yet again, Brown brings together an impressive selection of artists from a widely swept musical landscape. An artful curator, she explains the thinking behind her decision: “2 Chainz is one of those names that’s fully transcended the title of ‘rapper’ – he’s so much more than that! Having him on the cover was a really interesting contrast to Brockhampton, and D Double E is an integral part of Britain’s musical identity, so much so that we couldn’t not have him on the cover.”

Inside the mag itself, contributing editor Amaury Lateef Ávalos compares 2 Chainz to a ‘modern day Plato’, whilst hidden in the middle is a zine that uses the Chinese Zodiac calendar to create a visual tribute of all the dogs in hip hop, by west coast design studio Hard.

With Brick magazine in its fourth year, Brown continues to champion not only heavyweight music artists, but a personal collection of editorial, design, and photography talent that she speaks of with equal admiration: “I loved seeing Nico (Young) photograph Brockhampton – seeing other photographers work is so interesting to me, and standing on the edge of the pool whilst he dove underwater to capture the guys doing handstands was really joyful.”

To celebrate edition 5’s launch, last night Brick hosted an in-store launch at New York’s Sneakersnstuff, with a selection of images from the magazine being showcased in the space over the next month.

For Brown, though there’s no time to rest. “I feel like I say this every time someone asks me what’s up next, but we’re already working on the next edition – so it’s mostly that! Every time we put the magazine together, there’s always too many ideas for the number of pages we have, so it’s weirdly exciting to start at square one again.”

Brick edition 5 is available now