What has changed in Harry Styles' style? From Elton John to Dick Tracy

There was a moment, between roughly 2017 and 2023, when Harry Styles was at the absolute peak of his fame. In what is perhaps one of the most famous alliances between music and fashion of the 22nd century, Styles’s aesthetic was indissolubly linked to that of Gucci by Alessandro Michele, to the point where Styles collaborated with the creative director on an entire collection called Gucci HA HA HA, in June 2022, now considered the “jumping the shark” moment after which the artistic partnership between the two began to fall apart.

A few months after the collection’s release, Michele left Gucci, while the album Harry’s House marked a turning point in the singer’s career, although he continued to wear his sequin overalls, fur coats, sheer tops, and fringed lamé trousers until 2023, both for the Love On Tour and the Brit Awards.

To be fair, Styles wasn’t only wearing Gucci during that period: we all still remember that cardigan by JW Anderson, the Egonlab jumpsuit, and various outfits signed by Molly Goddard, Loewe, Eliou, and S.S. Daley, a brand he even became an investor in in 2024. Meanwhile, riding the genderless wave, Styles and his stylist Harry Lambert launched the brand Pleasing in 2021, producing nail polish and perfumes and also collaborating with JW Anderson in December 2024. Today, however, things have changed slightly—but how?

New album, new life

After a few years of hiatus and a (not entirely successful) attempt to launch a film career, Styles returned to music in March 2026 with Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally., an album that abandoned the psychedelic romance of his previous era in favor of more electro-disco sounds. The aesthetic shift, however, was already evident from the cover: a simple pair of jeans and a blue knitted T-shirt made by knitwear artist Patrick Carroll, very distant from the kitsch of the Love On Tour and much more aligned with the new normcore direction that has dominated menswear in recent years.

If in his frequent street sightings Styles’s new uniform seems to consist of very short shorts, low-top sneakers and playful or retro-leaning tops, with or without a long trench coat depending on the weather, his public appearances contain perhaps even more fashion than before.

In addition to the ensemble by Versace by Dario Vitale with which he appeared in the promotional visuals for the project We Belong Together, Styles has embraced a more traditional-than-usual style that has surprised many—made of jackets and ties, mixed suits, and flat shoes—but whose true essence is color. But has this new stylistic direction really broken radically with the past?

Sartorial maximalism

With a chromatic taste reminiscent of the colorful costumes of Dick Tracy, stylist Harry Lambert has dressed Styles using various triads of colors or complementary tone combinations: there have been many yellows ranging from lemon to butter shades; numerous pairings with fresh cobalt blues or light blues; combinations of reds, oranges, and burgundies, as well as several neutral tones to ground the look. The whole is animated by carefully studied deviations from form: a dalmatian-print shirt, white leather jazz shoes, ties, and even a custom Chanel blazer in which the classic pinstripes appear eroded and therefore almost three-dimensional. Another look included a red bomber jacket paired with a light blue shirt with a white collar, a floral tie, blue trousers, and white shoes.

Styles’s new look plays heavily on proportions: the various pieces feature very pronounced structural elements, including shirt collars, shoulders, and jacket lapels, as well as balloon-shaped trousers with curved lines, always paired with flat, elastic-looking shoes. The sense of dynamism is further emphasized by the combination of fabrics, sometimes compact and silky, sometimes porous, and by the unexpected highlights of white socks.

It is no coincidence that many of the outfits seen on the singer are signed by Celine by Michael Rider, Valentino, and Prada. The style has been defined as “corp-core” by Lambert himself, although the label seems insufficient. In essence, it is sartorial maximalism that moves from the glam and ’70s vibes of the Michele era to 1980s pop atmospheres.

A new kind of menswear

Styles’s famous androgyny has not disappeared: the cropped knitted T-shirt he wore at the Wembley concert, for example, suggests that womenswear may now resemble menswear, rather than the other way around. Also at Wembley, Styles wore an S.S. Daley suit consisting of a pinstriped blazer, slightly flared trousers cropped at the ankle with a pink belt, a light blue shirt, and underneath it a yellow floral tank top. Marsèll shoes and white socks completed the look, subtly referencing Fred Astaire’s outfits. On this point, the online discussion split: do today’s more masculine looks confirm yesterday’s queerbaiting?

Sometimes fashion is just fashion

It is true that Styles has, in his own way, been revolutionary in becoming an ambassador of genderless fashion, even if he ultimately pushed it into commercial territory to the point of excess. But every pop star in every era has benefited from and capitalized on their success and their ability to spark debate. And those debates, in that sense, were positive.

It is also true that Styles’s genderless phase took place in the era of peak woke, when identity politics rhetoric turned queer aesthetics and androgyny in general into the most engaging and marketable topic of all. It is not unthinkable that a pop star adopts the trends of the era they are in: in Italy, both Måneskin and Achille Lauro did the same, even at Sanremo, just as today a sleazepop artist like 2Hollis does. Today, not only have those trends changed, but Styles’s audience has grown with him, so it makes sense that his wardrobe has matured accordingly.

It would be unfair to say that Styles has rejected his previous way of dressing: he has rather updated it. What has changed instead is the media narrative, which—always in search of controversy and clicks, or at least new stories to attract attention—has stopped presenting the singer as the figurehead of a larger social movement, instead stoking debate in comment sections. And, not least, Styles’s new outfits work very well: sometimes, in the end, fashion is just fashion.