To celebrate the opening this week of a National Portrait Gallery exhibition exploring the musician’s influence on contemporary art, we take a look at his style and its legacy. These pictures will give you the information you need about Michael Jackson’s fashion history.
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The floral shirt, the zany patterned jacket and tight trousers all scream seventies. This picture of Michael Jackson, taken in 1972, could have come straight from Gucci designer Alessandro Michele’s moodboard for the past few seasons. Unashamedly clashing patterns featured on the catwalks of Versace and Dries van Noten during the most recent round of menswear shows, too.
Photograph: Michael Putland/Getty Images
Wearing suits that look as if they were inspired by Skittles, the Jackson Five are photographed here in 1975. It’s a get-up that would win them fashion-favor today – there’s been a rainbow of zingy Crayola colors on catwalks in recent years, from Virgil Abloh’s recent first offering for Louis Vuitton to Balenciaga and Molly Goddard. Colorful tailoring is very much in favor, too – look to next spring’s offerings from Acne Studios and Dries van Noten for details.
Photograph: Fin Costello/Redferns
It was the summer of ’79 and Jackson wore a Hawaiian-print shirt to an event to celebrate the Jacksons’ gold records. It’s a look that’s been ubiquitous in recent times – in 2017 Hawaiian shirts were the headline news in menswear and could be found everywhere, from Balenciaga to Gap. In the most recent round of shows, there’s been no shying away from tropical prints either.
Photograph: John T Barr/Getty Images
A young Michael Jackson in 1979: His all-brown outfit is straight from an era when car keys got put in bowls and cheese and pineapple got put on cocktail sticks. Although it’s been a firm Prada favorite through the years, being a notoriously tricky color to wear, brown has often been out of fashion’s favor. The all-brown 70s suit featured on Gucci’s catwalk for spring/summer 2017, but not all mono-toning is murky. For spring/summer 2019, Versace’s models wore lurid all-pink and fluoro highlighter-yellow suits.
Photograph: Jim McCrary/Redferns
Same year, very different sartorial mood – Saturday Night Fever had come out the previous year and Michael Jackson clearly knew how to show it here, wearing a bow-tie and sequinned jacket. It’s an outfit that wouldn’t have looked out of place on the Saint Laurent catwalk in New York earlier this month, for Anthony Vaccarello’s spring/summer 2019 menswear show.
Photograph: Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
In Amsterdam to promote Off the Wall in 1980, MJ here looks like he’s transitioned seamlessly from 70s disco-chic to 80s lounge lizard. The T-shirt under the suit feels very Wham – or Louis Vuitton spring/summer 2019.
Photograph: Sunshine/Rex/Shutterstock
This tiny-waisted, leather-jacketed look from the 1982 video for Thriller is one of Jackson’s best known, and most emulated. The look is as popular for Halloween as it is in high-fashion – from Maison Margiela’s autumn/winter 2008 collection to, more recently, next season’s Balmain menswear collection by Olivier Rousteing, which was an ode to the Prince of Pop’s style, white socks and all.
Photograph: Venice Film Festival
Clearly of the thinking that it’s better to be over than under-dressed, MJ wore a sparkly military-chic jacket complete with gold epaulettes and sash to meet then-president Ronald and first lady Nancy Reagan at the White House in 1984. It’s a look he brought back for the Grammys that same year. From Melania Trump’s recent military-style jacket with a controversial slogan to Off-White’s spring/summer 2019 menswear show, mode a le martial remains popular.
Photograph: Scott Stewart/AP
You know it’s fashion gold when Beyoncé’s biting your style – Michael Jackson wore this suit with gold harness-style belt to play the Rose Bowl in Pasadena in 1993, Queen Bey wore a reimagined version, created by Dsquared2 designers Dean and Dan Caten, to play the same Super Bowl stage in 2016 in a political performance of Formation. MJ-esque metallics were massive this season, from Rick Owens to Saint Laurent to Balmain.
Photograph: Steve Granitz/WireImage