It’s been a refreshing summer treat to see so much of America’s former first couple Michelle and Barack Obama back on the radar, around the opening of the Barack Obama Presidential Center in Chicago late June.
True to form, Michelle Obama has been making some seriously fashionable moves. And after a year and a half of MAGA 2.0 fashion dominating Washington — a static, conformist look popular among conservative women featuring big hair, heavy makeup, high-heels and “old money” tweeds and structured dresses — watching the former first lady experiment boldly with powerful, individualistic personal presentation makes it feel like progress could be possible again.
The 62-year-old’s wardrobe for the centre’s opening events featured elegant, interesting, often shoulder-baring looks from established designer labels like Celine and new ones like American denim brand Ossou.
Los Angeles streetwear brand Fear of God made her a custom 44 T-shirt, her husband’s presidential number. Swedish label Acne Studios created another sentimental bespoke piece for her: a skirt printed with an image of her late mother’s face.
Obama capped things off with an appearance at the Essence Festival of Culture on July 3 in a sharp black dress with a thigh-high slit and oversized grommet details by Proenza Schouler, designed by Rachel Scott, the first Black Jamaican woman to helm an American brand.
“I think it is genius,” said Toronto-based styling expert Afiya Francisco. “Now that she no longer has to appeal to the masses, we see that Michelle is serious about fashion.” Obama always dresses appropriately for the occasion but is now free to push the boundaries. “But because she always pulls off her looks, it makes you look again and consider how an item works.”
Everything Michelle Obama wears is intentional. For the official launch of the Presidential Center, her marquee outfit was a seersucker suit with a pique corset and matching white wingtip pumps, all from American designer Thom Browne. “The details are fantastic,” said Vancouver-based stylist Tracy Richardson. “The stripes are not overpowering, the fringe on the suit and the scalloping on the corset add a softness to the look.”
Then there is the cream, off-the-shoulder Kallmeyer New York dress Michelle wore for the couple’s People Magazine cover shoot. “The top has beautiful, clean lines. It says I’m confident, I’m classic,” said Richardson, pointing out the transparent hem with appliqué details adds whimsy and personality.
Fashion in politics — and life after politics, too — is important. Clothing transmits messages and creates a conversation, something Michelle Obama knows keenly as the first presidential spouse to serve at the dawn of the internet age, where there was suddenly a forum for everyone to weigh in on her every cardigan. Like the most effective celebrities and royals, Obama used clothing to get people to listen to what she was saying.
She detailed her journey with clothing and self-expression within that rarefied fishbowl in her 2025 book, “The Look,” written with her longtime stylist Meredith Koop, who has worked with her since day one in Washington. “Fashion had become an important part of my identity during our time in the White House,” Obama wrote. “I saw how I could use it—to elevate not just my initiatives and values, but also the designers I wore, while all along continuing to focus most on who I wanted to be inside the fashion.”
Together Koop and Obama developed a wardrobe of signatures: Matching sets, monochromatic tailored suiting, statement belts, pearls, straight hair. She wore a high-low mix of accessible brands like J.Crew and Target paired with emerging and diverse independent designers, including Canadian-in-New York Jason Wu, who designed both of Obama’s inauguration gowns.
Then there were the sleeveless dresses, which came to epitomize the high-wire line she was walking as America’s first Black first lady. “I saw some people’s fixation on my arms as another way to ‘otherize’ me. Barack and I were being portrayed as Black people who didn’t understand the ‘rules’ of the rarefied world we had found ourselves in and were not unequivocally welcomed into,” Obama wrote in the book. “And yet, the upside was the number of women who told me they felt more comfortable showing their arms after seeing me in these dresses or tops. I was honored that those people saw my arms as a symbol of strength.”
In those years, Obama and Koop kept it safe, on purpose. “While in the White House, her outfits were accessible, approachable, and ‘every woman,’” said Francisco. “Especially as the first Black first lady, this was critical to be seen as credible and palatable to the public, and truly the only way that she could have built such a huge platform for real change.”
In her post-White House era, Obama is experiencing fashion in a new way. She’s embarked upon two book tours, taking more risks each time, becoming more herself as she sheds the protocols and proscriptions of being the first lady.
A real payoff moment came when she delivered a speech about Kamala Harris at the 2024 Democratic National Convention, wearing a deconstructed navy pantsuit with criss-cross lapel and cropped pants by the New York brand Monse. “This super cool sleeveless suit evoked many projections and metaphors, including “baring arms” for the fight that lay ahead to elect our first Black female President of the United States,” Obama writes in her book.
People also commented on her hair. “Njeri Radway, a licensed cosmetologist and braid expert, had done my hair in tree braids, which she side-parted and wove into a larger plait that cascaded down my back.” By then, people were used to seeing Obama in braids, which caused “a stir among Black women celebrating that America was finally ready to see their former first lady wearing a natural protective style.”
Of course, that’s not true of all Americans. Last month, just past the front steps of the White House at a Freedom 250 cage fight hosted by Donald Trump, UFC fighter Josh Hokit yelled on camera, “Michelle Obama is a man.” She didn’t respond, going high as always. “While I’m sure that the criticism must at times sting — particularly when it’s motivated by the lowest-base criteria like race or appearance,” said Francisco, “she presents as the epitome of unbothered.”
The fact that Michelle Obama continues to push boundaries and express more of herself after so many years spent buttoned up, makes her a dynamic leader worth watching.
