As the leading light of 2024's abrupt cowboycore revival, Beyoncé must demonstrate the movement's aesthetic ideal.
Beyoncé is setting cowboycore's pace and, in a rare paparazzi photo taken on April 1, demonstrating the aesthetic's real-world utility.
Out in Los Angeles while new album Cowboy Carter climbs the charts, Beyoncé and Converse-loving daughter Blue Ivy attended a few business calls that, obviously, demand cowboy clothes suitable for a professional setting.
And so, here we have the Cowboy Carter Canadian Tux.
Camera-shy Beyoncé is wearing a denim suit, down to the matching cowboy hat. But this is no ordinary double denim; it's double denim done the Beyoncé way, with all the little details dialed in.
Notice the just-so slouch of the relaxed shirt that's tucked into a Really Good pair of elastic-waisted, wide-legged pants (complete with pleats).
Now, you can't really tell if Beyonce's rockin' a denim jumpsuit or an actual denim-on-denim set but the effect is unchanged either way.
There's some smart styling throughout Beyoncé's outfit, like the studded Western belt that gently breaks up the waistline, the barely-visible cowboy boots fitted with a hefty Cuban-style heel to lift up those giant jeans, and the enormous reflective shades identical to those worn by every sheriff in every '70s movie ever.
Here I'll cop to being a little tired of the whole cowboycore thing already. It immediately felt a little too effortful, inevitable for something all but forced into existence by the rich, famous, and all-too influential.
Nothing against Beyoncé's album or Pharrell's Louis Vuitton westernwear but it had the cynical forcefulness typical of any corporate hype machine.
But at least you can appreciate Beyoncé's Canadian tux on a tangible level.
This is, simply, a cool outfit with solid proportions and a natty grasp of how the cowboycore look translates to real life.
Especially compared to Beyoncé's impossibly luxe red carpet looks rife with big-dollar luxury, this sort of cowboy-tinged casualwear is even more appreciated because it's actually approachable.
Who can't aspire to tuck a big ol' chambray shirt into bigger ol' jeans? Indeed, the only way to make cowboycore really go mass is to ground it, like Bey did here.
This is cowboycore at its best, free of high-falutin' costumes. Lasso up more looks like this, if you please.
