Nueva Yol! Bad Bunny returned to the Met Gala this evening—his fourth, if you’re keeping count (and we are)—to celebrate the opening of “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style” decked out in Prada.
“We started planning the look since at least January,” he told Vogue. “When we found out that it was about Black fashion we got really excited because we felt like we could really connect it to Puerto Rican Afro-Caribbean culture.”
On the first Sunday in May, we caught up with Bad Bunny (born Benito Antonio Martinez Ocasio) while he was taking a break from an ongoing domino tournament with his friends to get a mani-pedi at his hotel. “We wanted something classic because we really wanted to experiment with textures.”
His latest record, Debí Tirar Más Fotos, is a love letter to Puerto Rico and Puerto Rican culture, so it’s not surprising that the textures he is referring to have a distinct Boricua vibe. His custom carob brown kid mohair suit, with a cropped jacket and a slightly flared trouser, brings to mind the kind of suits worn in the ’70s by salsa legends like Willie Colón and Héctor Lavoe. Accessorizing his tobacco poplin shirt is a tie made out of raffia, the same material used in the traditional pava, the Puerto Rican jíbaro hat. The pava is also the inspiration for the hat he’s wearing, made by De León Headwear, who also did the pava-inspired crown he wore on the latest Vogue Mexico cover. At his final fitting, it was his belt that seemed to capture his imagination the most. “I love this belt! I remember I asked for it because I have been wearing a rope belt, and I asked for them to make it into something more fashion.” It is another reference to the jíbaros of the Puerto Rican mountainside, who used to hold their pants up with rope, and it’s something that Bad Bunny has been wearing on and off as part of his new record’s aesthetic. Topping off the look are a pair of leather gloves in the same shade of carob brown as the suit—embellished with over 600 yellow crystals—an old-school bowling bag, and natural canvas cowboy-style boots that walked the brand’s spring fall 2025 menswear show. (The sign of a true dandy? He gets a mani-pedi even when he’s wearing gloves and boots.) The bowling bag he is carrying is also laden with meaning. “In my head this bag really encapsulates the theme of the album. I just announced the global tour and today is my mom’s birthday…so this bag represents everything that I am carrying with me everywhere I go around the world, all the good things that I carry with me.
While the Puerto Rican superstar was a cohost at last year’s Met Gala, this year he gets to just enjoy himself. “It’s nice because you don’t have to be the first to arrive,” he says. “Last year I greeted literally everybody, but I still had fun, you know, because I got to see what everybody was wearing and I got to critique all the looks.” Although he’s been to the event many times before, he’s open to seeing where the night takes him. “I always enjoy myself. One year I saw Pedro Pascal. It was the first time we met, but if he’s there tonight then that’s going to be super cool. Last year Rosalía was at my table, and it was nice…. So it really depends.”
Perfume is a recurring theme in Bad Bunny songs—there’s a song literally called “Perfumito Nuevo” on the record, and on another track he sings that he smells good. So I have to ask: What scent will he be wearing tonight? “I love perfumes that have unusual scents. Sometimes people have told me they don’t like how I smell because they’re so uncommon. But I love them. I brought five bottles of different scents on this trip to New York,” he said, adding, “My favorite way to create memories is through songs and through scent, so I love to wear a perfume when I go on a trip, and then I put it away so that later I can grab the bottle and go on a trip.”
But what perfume will he actually wear tonight? “I don’t know what I’m going to wear, but now that you’re putting pressure on me I kind of want to go out and pick a new one up just to wear at The Met.” If anyone catches a whiff of Bad Bunny tonight, please report back.
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