Instead of wearing red, white, or blue, Melania Trump went with a black-and-white polka-dot dress to cast her ballot on Election Day in Palm Beach, Fla.
While many former first ladies favor American brands for global photo-ops, Trump opted for a frock from Dior and sunglasses to vote at the Morton and Barbara Mandel Recreation Center. The shirtdress was not a new purchase, but one that the former model wore recently for a television interview about her memoir “Melania.”
Meanwhile, Donald Trump switched up his usual run-of-the-mill all-business look by not wearing a red necktie, unbuttoning his suit jacket and wearing a red MAGA baseball hat. In the final week of campaigning, the vice president and Democratic candidate Kamala Harris also relaxed her style a bit, wearing a denim pantsuit on one occasion and jeans with a blazer on another.
While Gabriela Hearst and Chloé have been go-to fashion resources for Harris, Dior has been one for Melania Trump. When returning to the international stage last summer, she chose another Dior ensemble from her closet. The Slovenian-born former model went with a red Dior suit for her appearance at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee. The ensemble was a modern version of the Christian Dior “Bar” suit.
The former FLOTUS, who became a U.S. citizen in 2006, had sported the red Dior during her White House years for an official visit to Paris to meet French president Emmanuel Macron and his wife Brigitte Macron in 2017.
More recently, there was another French connection with the Trumps — namely to an heir of Dior’s parent company LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton — that attracted a lot of attention. Alexandre Arnault was in the crowd at Donald Trump’s rally at Madison Square Garden last month. In addition to being a LVMH Moët Hennessy board member, he is executive vice president of product, communications and industrial at U.S. jeweler Tiffany & Co.
In 2019, his father Bernard, LVMH chairman and chief executive officer, showed off the company’s then new leather goods workshop in rural Alvarado, Texas, with the former president to play up the Trump administration’s jobs-creation record, but during that media event, Arnault noted, “I’m not here to judge any types of policies.”
Bernard Arnault said at that time, “This shows two commitments: One, the commitment of LVMH to the American market, and two, the commitment of President Trump to the American worker.”
In New York City, Tiffany & Co. and the Trumps have another common point. The Fifth Avenue flagship that the actress Audrey Hepburn immortalized in “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” is a short walk from Trump Tower.
While the 78-year-old Trump and his wife planned to catch Tuesday night’s results at the Palm Beach Convention Center, the 60-year-old Harris was heading back to her alma mater Howard University for a watch party with her husband Doug Emhoff.
