Houston Grillz Master Johnny Dang and His World Of Bling — One of Texas’ True Over-the-Top Characters

Art direction Michelle Aviña. Photography Antonio Chicaia.

Dang Anh Tuan may not be a household name, but the moniker this Vietnamese immigrant adopted after his 1996 arrival in Houston is. Drop the name Johnny Dang, and you’re immediately an insider in the blinged-out music kingdom of global hip-hop stars and rap moguls.

But Dang’s fame as a jeweler extends beyond that genre. To borrow a music term, he’s a crossover talent who embodies the immigrant dreams and possibilities of making it big in Houston. Then there is the national renown: inclusion in a major museum show aligned with the 50-year anniversary of hip-hop. “Ice Cold: An Exhibition of Hip-Hop Jewelry” enjoyed an eight-month run at Manhattan’s American Museum of Natural History.

The exhibition followed the hefty Taschen book of the same name by Vikki Tobak, which featured a shout out to Johnny Dang as well as images of his over-the-top bling, most notably his now iconic, channel-set grillz designed for Paul Wall (who would become his partner in taking the Southern grillz phenomenon to fame and fortune for them both). Also highlighted in Taschen’s Ice Cold are Dang’s opulent commissions for DaBaby, Quavo, Travis Scott, Big Sean and Lizzo.

In her volume, Tobak notes that Dang is “known for creating some of the most memorable teeth adornment of the modern era.”

Adding to the legend of this grillz master are profiles or name checks on Dang in publications from Forbes and Vice to The New York Times Magazine. In the NYT’s story “Hip-Hop at Fifty: A Brief History of Bling,” author Daniel Levin Becker writes: “Paul Wall (appeared) on Nelly’s 2005 hit Grillz, an ode to the titular dental jewelry. . .

“Soon after, Walls’s partnership with the Vietnamese jeweler Johnny Dang, whose Houston workshop’s clientele now ranges from Beyoncé to Floyd Mayweather, was booming. Even when you’re wearing a ring, necklace and watch, grills stand out most,’ Dang says. ‘It’s diamonds in your mouth!’”

A Golden Afternoon at Johnny Dang & Co

Arriving at Johnny Dang & Co’s Houston headquarters — located along Richmond Avenue west of The Galleria in an area dotted with restaurants, small-retail establishments and apartment complexes — became the start of a literally dazzling afternoon, dripping in diamonds and other precious gemstones edged in gold and platinum.

After parking behind gilded gates and checked in by discrete armed guards, we met rising hip-hop star RNB.FOEMOB and his viral Texas video producer Dorian Green of DGreen Filmz. We gawked at groaning cases of baubles, paying special attention to the luscious grillz that are Dang’s calling card and took a behind-the-scenes look at the phalanx of gem artists who handcraft creations in the workshop.

Dang employs more than 80 artisans and staff in a total of three locations. In a case filled with dental molds of Dang’s glittering clients, a few names caught our eye: Jay-Z, A$AP Rocky, BossMan Dlow (who dropped $120,000 on a GIA diamond-encrusted set), Drake, Will Smith, Katy Perry, Shaq, GloRilla, Ludacris, Kim Lee, J Prince, Cam Newton, Jeremy Peña, Post Malone, Dream Doll and Saweetie.

We entered the throne room, which is the private client domain. This over-the-top chamber is also the setting for the Flawless podcast led by Johnny Dang and retailer/personality Mike Mills, whose streetwear/sneaker boutique is located upstairs. In between a constant stream of cool industry insiders and staff, coming in and out of the room we chatted up the charismatic Dang.

Grillz: A Primer + The House of Johnny Dang

But first, a grillz primer.

As cited in Taschen’s Ice Cold, wealthy women of the Etruscan civilization (precursors to the Romans) had their front teeth removed and replaced by gold versions to underscore stature in high society. Tricked-out teeth as wealth signifiers were also the order of the day for Mayan kings and queens. Instead of gold, jade roundels adorned the upper teeth of their mystic royals. In 14th century Philippines, removable bands of gold worn over front teeth, chakang, were passed down through generations as venerated family heirlooms.

Centuries later, with the nascent emergence of hip-hop in New York City, bling reigned.

“My jewels are my superhero suit. . . a gift from ancestors who sat on thrones and reigned with rings and rocks the size of ice cubes,” says Ricky Walters, aka Slick Rick, in the foreword to Ice Cold. Author Vikki Tobak traces the presence of grillz in hip-hop baubles to the genre’s beginnings in the 1970s.

“Even the term bling first came to be used on the streets of Brooklyn as Jamaican slang made its way over from the West Indies,” she writes. “As the legend goes, the lack of good dental care in Jamaica made gold teeth popular replacements. Bling was the sound of shine.”

The word grillz, Tobak notes, specifically references “the ornate grilles of luxury vehicles.”

Twenty years ago, the term officially entered pop culture with Nelly’s aforementioned 2005 music video Grillz, which fortuitously featured a cameo by Dang’s business partner, rapper Paul Wall, which led to the explosion of the pair’s budding empire. During that era, Dang tells us, he was filling orders for upwards of 450 grillz a month

A sampling of the song’s lyrics says it all about the opulence and indulgence of these street bijoux:

What it do, baby? (Uh), it’s the iceman, Paul Wall (yeah)
I got my mouth lookin’ somethin’ like a disco ball (yeah)
I got the diamonds and the ice, all hand set
I might cause a cold front if I take a deep breath (already)

My mouthpiece simply certified a total package
Open up my mouth, and you see more carats than a salad (c’mon, man)
My teeth are mind blowin’ givin’ everybody chills
Call me George Foreman, ‘cause I’m sellin’ everybody grillz

Today, custom grillz are the couture of hip-hop style, collectible and to be changed out like any other accessory. At the top of the list of in-demand jewelers is Dang, whose dazzling pop-on embellishments for celebrity clients, especially performers, can take months to complete. It’s not uncommon for Dang’s signature grillz ornamented with diamonds and other jelly bean-colored jewels to reach into the five or six figures for statements that light up social media.

Beyond the glitz, though, Johnny Dang & Co is a family-owned affair. He honed his craft from his grandfather and father. Dang’s father immigrated to Houston in the early 1980s, opening a jewelry shop in a flea market, then urging his son to get in the biz and move to Texas.

We met Dang’s son Johnny Jr. He’s a disarming college student who appears in Dang & Co’s social media posts, rocking his understated preppy look by the addition of grillz and other bijoux candy.

“I always have family involved. . . my mom, my brothers,” Dang says.

There’s a community focus, too — most notably carried out via an epic annual back-to-school block party (Paul Wall performs) capped by a backpack and school supplies giveaway.

As for future expansion, Dang says he’s looking into Miami, and maybe Dallas.

The Innovator: Diamond Boyz Style

Johnny Dang’s initial technical breakthrough was forging grillz that did not require teeth to be filed down. He followed that by an artistic tour de force, realized first in a commission for Migos rapper Quavo: invisibly set, emerald-cut baguette grillz, which soon became the ultimate accessory to sport in the hip-hop world.

By this time, Dang and Paul Wall — who initially met at Sharpstown Mall, where Dang had a store and Wall deejayed — were business partners.

“You have to keep giving customers something new and special to keep them coming back,” Dang told Forbes.

In that vein, the latest maximal look from Johnny Dang & Co is the “honeymoon” style. Check out Megan Thee Stallion’s GIA-certified oval-and-pink diamond honeymoon-set grillz on TikTok. Sporting his own blinding honeymoon grillz for social media, Wall proclaims in a cheeky video: “We got engagement rings on every tooth, man. If she don’t say I do to this, she is not the one for you.

“The only way you can get one of these is calling Johnny Dang & Co right now, today.” 

“It’s an American dream,” Dang says, reflecting on his success. “I think, No. 1, it’s a mentality from immigration. The first six months here, I made $500, my first-ever money. I was so happy. Now (three decades later), I have so much work, so many clients, and that’s why I have a team.”

See the jeweler and his posse star in That Mexican OT’s music video for the song Johnny Dang (featuring Paul Wall and Drodi) here.