Mysterious Melania

Polly Vernon on America’s most enigmatic First Lady

Two things struck me on watching Melania Trump address the Republican National Convention on Tuesday night. The first was: but she’s got an accent! A ridiculous response actually, because of course Melania Trump’s got an accent. She’s Slovenian; she came to the US in 1996, aged 26, already equipped with the sort of accent only a fraud would attempt to hide, shake, substitute. Though equally, I suppose, my surprise on hearing her voice does testify to how unused I am to Melania speaking in public at all. How unused we all are; among us, the actress Bette Midler, who sparked a row on social media after mocking Melania as “an illegal alien” who “still can’t speak English”, thereby inviting accusations of xenophobia, even from the most hardened anti-trump quarters.

It does rather remind us, how very little we know about Melania; how enigmatic she is. How mysterious she has chosen to remain from us, certainly in comparison with all the first ladies who came before her.

The second thing to occur to me, was: she’s much better at this than I’d have anticipated. Softer, more convincing, more personable. Much more human. She hit all the notes required of her. She flattered her husband’s “base”, his diehard supporters, commending the chance they took, four years ago, on a politically unproven businessman (thereby reinforcing Trump’s credentials as an outsider of the US political establishment, a quality his

“people” relish in him); but she also invoked Covid-19 and women’s rights, then teased her husband for his social media excesses, in a way that made you think she meant it. Which is not to say she did, or that she has any right to make such proclamations, or that her performance wasn’t planned and constructed and coached to the nth degree… who knows. But, regardless: it demonstrated there is clearly previously unsuspected political artistry to Melania Trump.

She looked the part, too. If you felt there was a touch of the Bond villainess to her presentation, that might be a little latent sexism stirring. We are rather inclined to assume very obviously good-looking people lack credibility, or authenticity, after all; and to associate the innate glamour Melania projects with a hidden nefarious agenda, when it might actually speak more to an Eastern European aesthetic that tends to sway that way.

As for the jacket, its olive colour, structure and lapels would have seemed a little heavy handed in the military-referencing stakes, if they hadn’t also worked really well with her skin tone and eyes, emphasising the line on her cheekbones and her eyebrows, in such a way as to suggest they could equally well have just been a good fashion call. And if her blowdry was immaculate, it was perhaps 25 per cent less flouncy and flamboyant than normal, in the name of seriousness. (Also: I should very much like to know which shade of lip gloss she was wearing.)

All in all, she did well. Think and say what you will about her husband. Heaven knows, I have. But Melania Trump pulled this moment off. It might even represent her highest point, presentation wise. An accomplished climax of four years of her finessing and provoking us, with assorted fashion statements, hair styles, demeanours. It might in fact have been nothing other than her trying her best to look nice, with the world’s media focused on her. But, if you believe that pictures can paint a thousand words, this is what we’ve gleaned so far...

That Pink Shirt

October 2016

Melania Trump arrived at a presidential debate two short days after the emergence of the Access

Hollywood tape – in which Donald Trump was overheard talking about how being famous allowed him to “grab” women “by the p----” – wearing $1,100-worth (£830) of Gucci shirt, the neckline of which was secured by a large pussy-bow. Was she making a statement of proud defiance? If so, against whom? Her husband, whose casual disregard for the female anatomy cannot have been an absolute surprise to her? Or his detractors, who were attempting to unseat him with the leaked tape? Was she merely channelling fashion resonances of Margaret Thatcher, Grace Kelly, Nancy Reagan and Diana, Princess of Wales, all of whom favoured the PBB? Could she have known? Could she not have known? Did she just really like the blouse? We may never know, but heavens, it was fun speculating.

Powder Blue Ralph Lauren

January, 2017

Worn for Trump’s inauguration into the White House. It’s hard to imagine a situation in which this wasn’t intended as a reference to the powder-blue coat, pill box hat and – perhaps, most obviously – long gloves, which Jackie Kennedy wore to the 1961 inauguration of JFK. Powder blue is as mild and gentle in its approach and intentions as light pink, but rather more grown up; an unthreatening, respectful, faintly submissive expression of femininity. The opposite of red, if you will. The absence of cleavage and the updo might also be perceived as efforts to underplay the full impact of Melania’s sexuality.

All White for the 2018 State of the Union address

January, 2018

In January and February 2018, as the red carpets of all significant awards ceremonies – from the Golden Globes to the Baftas – were overrun by women dressed entirely in black, in a show of solidarity with the Metoo movement – much of which was grounded in a fundamental distaste for Trump, those who had allied themselves with him, and the culture that he and his p-----grabbing revelations were perceived as embodying – Melania wore head-totoe white at the State of the Union address in Washington.

A screaming disavowal of Metoo, a dismissal of all those women, and the things they’d suffered? Perhaps. At the same time, Melania’s choice of trouser suit could be perceived as a statement of feminist empowerment, even a coded message of support to Trump’s former opponent, Hillary Clinton, whose uniform of “pantsuits” had become a symbol of female political potency. This sounds less unlikely if you subscribe to the idea, as some do, that Melania makes her displeasure with her husband publicly known via the medium of menswear, which she adopts because Trump prefers women to dress in an uber-sexy feminine manner.

Pin-striped Ralph Lauren to greet Justin Trudeau at the White House

October, 2017

Maybe this is a case in point.

Monochrome Christian Dior on a state visit to Paris

July 2017

Which comes first? A desire to revere and celebrate the creative spirit, culture and history of the country you’re visiting in capacity as FLOTUS? Or a desire to wear Dior AMAP* (*As Much as Possible), which may or may not be associated with an eagerness not to be outdone by the eminently chic wife of the French president, with whom you’ll inevitably be pictured a lot, because that’s kind of why you’re in Paris? (Extra points for the Brigitte Bardotreferencing haute bouffe on the ponytail.)

Zara jacket, while visiting migrant children on the Us-mexico border

June 2018

A $39 (£29.50) army-green parka emblazoned with the words “I really don’t care, do u?”, worn on a visit to a migrant camp undertaken as the Trump administration rode out a storm over its zero-tolerance immigration policy: has any jacket ever provoked such wild speculation regarding its greater significance? Unlikely. But what did it mean? Was Melania telling us she didn’t care for her husband’s harsh immigration policy? Or was she telling the press that she didn’t care what they thought about her, or their attempts to gain greater understanding of her psyche by clumsily decoding her wardrobe choices – as I am doing now? Officials claimed it was merely a jacket. Anonymous sources said it was more likely intended as an undermining of her daughter-in-law, Ivanka Trump, and her efforts to align herself with the most likeable aspects of the presidency. Months later, Melania would tell an ABC News interviewer that she thought it “obvious” that it was nothing more than a jacket “to go on and off the plane”.

A suit, tie and Panama hat on visiting the Sphinx and pyramids

October 2018

How else to ensure you scene-steal from one of the seven wonders of the world, while simultaneously quietly invoking memories of Diana, Princess of Wales, alone outside the Taj Mahal, and ( just possibly) berating your husband over some private slight?