The Look

Gaddafi had a look. Not a sense of style—a look. One of those sustained performance-art projects that somehow got treated as real. He’d show up in a bedazzled military jacket, surrounded by female bodyguards in matching fatigues and designer sunglasses, and the world’s fashion press would nod and write it down. Vanity Fair called him a fashion genius. Time magazine seemed genuinely confused about what was happening but thought it was important enough to document. There’s a weird moment in media where an absurdity becomes so consistent that people stop questioning whether it’s intentional.

I’m not sure if he was actually that into fashion or if dressing like a Vegas strongman was just part of the brand. Probably some of both. The costumes were deliberate—enough gold and medals and fabric to fill a small stage—but also ridiculous in a way that made you unsure if he was in on the joke. That uncertainty is its own kind of power, I guess. You can’t dismiss a man who’s committed enough to the bit that you can’t tell if he’s serious.

The whole thing was absurd and fascistic and tragic and funny all at once, which is probably why people kept writing about it. It was easier to look at his outfits than at what was actually happening. A lot of tyrants try to seem powerful through restraint—the expensive suit, the measured tone. Gaddafi went the other direction. He dressed like his own propaganda film.

He’s dead now. The costumes are in museums or lost somewhere. The magazines moved on. But the images stick—the dictator as accidental fashion icon, committed enough to the costume that the costume outlasted him. Everything else disappears. The look remains.