Harry Styles & Gucci: The Highlights

It seems like only yesterday that Harry Styles’ signature look could be described best by the term ‘geek chic’. (Yes, we hate that phrase, too.)

As one fifth of One Direction, he had always seemed most at home in slouchy, casual combinations – always with the finishing touch of a beanie hat. It was the early 2010s, after all.

However, as the now Grammy award-winner began to branch out into his solo career, he quickly grew into a new, eclectic sense of style – one which led to his appointment as the face of Gucci in 2018. These days, he’s near-enough a shoe-in for the title of ‘best-dressed man in pop’.

Harry’s collaboration with the fashion house began with the release of the brand’s first official campaign after Alessandro Michele was appointed Gucci’s creative director in 2015. Given that this was a campaign three years in the making, it makes perfect sense that the brand had a mission in mind to get people talking – and they most certainly did.

Despite the campaign being released just a year after Harry had made his solo debut, he had long since grown out of his casual, boy band wardrobe. Even towards the tail-end of his years with One Direction, the singer had started to make subtle changes to his trademark look – switching out the skinny jeans for flares, abandoning his once-staple plain tees in favour of bold, graphic prints.

He had started to demonstrate a clear appreciation for luxury labels at public events, often dressing for appearances between 2014-2016 in brands that were worlds apart from the Hollister and Jack Wills items that he had once stepped out in regularly. Early favourites of his appeared to be Saint Laurent, Louis Vuitton and Dolce & Gabbana.

Whilst such looks undoubtedly caught attention and began to raise Styles’ profile as a blossoming fashion icon, he always seemed the most at home with the designs of his future collaborators, representing Gucci through his wardrobe on several occasions. He appeared to be building quite the collection of pieces by the label, specifically when it came to his seemingly endless rotation of vibrant, printed suits.

Gucci have always been bold, both in their prints and their silhouettes. For as long as the brand has been around, they have had a knack for creating designs which were able to come across as timeless, yet simultaneously contemporary, almost always ahead of the curve. As Harry Styles began to move away from his One Direction roots and carve out a new image and sound, resurrecting both the musical and fashion styles of the 1970s for a 21st century audience, he often favoured pieces by the brand for his public appearances. The wardrobe for his 2017 tour was almost entirely created by Alessandro Michele.

With all this in mind, the singer was the perfect fit as Michele launched his first official campaign for the brand as Creative Director.

This first campaign broke new ground for Gucci, with the images and accompanying short film shot on-location in a North London fish and chip shop. Styles appeared in a vast array of Michele’s latest designs for the campaign, which was released on November 3rd 2018. A post on the brand’s official Instagram account outlined their inspiration for the ‘narrative sequence’ as being the British films of decades past.

This was the start of a relationship between the two that has yielded some of the most talked-about looks of the last three years, including Harry’s iconic Gucci look at 2019’s Met Gala and his most recent feature in the talk show inspired Gucci Beloved campaign.

Here, we take a look back at some of the highlights of Harry’s tenure as the face of Gucci.