The Real Madrid star steps into Pharrell Williams’ tailored world, where suits borrow from workwear and ceremony meets the tunnel.
The pictures set the tone. Cool studio light. Dense marine blue suiting. Hands in patch pockets shaped like a chore coat. Jude Bellingham, a year on from being named a Friend of the House, is now the face of Louis Vuitton’s Spring Summer 2026 formalwear campaign. He looks comfortable, which is the point. The clothes do not ask for deference. They move. See the products here.
Pharrell’s menswear has been building toward this. His formal proposition sits on a workbench as much as a cutting table. You see it in the details. Patch-pocketed jackets cut boxy and honest. A grey zip-front with leather pockets that reads like industrial outerwear, paired with a black quarter-zip knit that keeps the silhouette clean. A sharp dark grey two-piece under a matching blouson and a mid-length coat. It sounds like layering for a cold boardroom, yet the lines stay light. Nothing clumps.
The materials keep the tension between utility and polish. Suiting cloth where you expect canvas. Leather where you expect flannel. Zips where you expect horn buttons. Pharrell has been pulling this thread across his tenure, from luxe boots and hardwearing, monogrammed double-knee trousers to tailoring that nods to uniforms and shop floors. Here, he applies that language to classic dress, then trims the speech. It reads as dandyism with dirt under the fingernails.
Bellingham is a savvy casting. At Real Madrid he has the calm that luxury loves and the momentum brands chase. Football’s crossover with fashion is no longer a novelty, but the midfield star slotting into formalwear is still a choice. There will be those who want a Savile Row mannequin, unbothered by a 90th-minute equalizer. Yet the modern customer understands the suit as part of a daily system. From tunnel walk to dinner table to airport lounge. A player who captains his image in public gives that system credibility.
Pharrell’s own orbit matters here. Music has always treated dress codes as raw material. Hip-hop rewired tailoring in the 90s. Skate and workwear shaped proportions in the 2000s. This collection sits in that lineage. It hears the clink of glasses and the scrape of metal benches at once. The campaign’s mood carries that sound. Low light, controlled stance, fabric that photographs with weight but does not look heavy.
There is also a club-level narrative running alongside the campaign. Earlier this summer, Louis Vuitton announced bespoke travel outfits for the Real Madrid squad, with Bellingham front and center. Those designs are for the team. The SS26 formalwear is not. It arrives in Louis Vuitton stores on August 28, just as the new season starts. Timing matters. Tunnel fits have become weekly runway looks, which has trained a mass audience to read silhouettes. Expect sharp eyes on these jackets.
Market-wise, the collection addresses a real question. How do men dress up without dressing old. The answer here is workwear intelligence applied to ceremony. It is not rebellious. It simply refuses fussy. The reception will likely split along familiar lines. Tailoring purists will miss padded shoulders and surgeon cuffs. Everyone else will see a suit that behaves like a jacket you actually wear.
Bellingham’s role is not to sell a dream. It is to show a version of reality that already exists. Athletes live in transit and on camera. The clothes reflect that rhythm. Louis Vuitton’s formalwear under Pharrell continues to chase the middle of that Venn diagram. In SS26, it lands squarely on it.
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