The pictures coming out of Afghanistan have been so heartbreakingly dreary that when that country’s interim leader, Hamid Karzai, resplendent in robes of many colors, stepped onto the international stage recently more than a few folks took notice.
Even certified fashion guru Tom Ford, the creative force at Gucci, was impressed and anointed Karzai, “The chicest man on the planet today.”
One London paper dubbed Karzai, “The most unlikely style icon since . . . Mahatma Gandhi.”
In a diplomatic scene so often dominated by triple-buttoned and double-breasted grays and blues, Karzai, 44, has earned his stripes as one snappy dresser. He wears neatly tailored sport coats atop the banded-collar tunic-plus-trousers combo called piran-tunban. Enriching the look is a chapan, a multihued robe of lush fabric. His choice in hats, a topper made of wool from the qaraqul lamb, complements his well-groomed salt-and-pepper beard and mustache.
Glenn O’Brien, author of The Style Guy column for Gentlemen’s Quarterly, was in Milan for the menswear shows when Ford made his Karzai pronouncement.
“I do think he has a real sense of style,” says O’Brien, who figures the “chic” label has as much to do with the clothing as it does “the way he puts it together.”
“It’s done attractively. It’s more a Brad Pitt than a Taliban. There’s a little beard and a moustache, but it’s well taken care of,” says O’Brien.
But there may be more than meets the eye in Karzai’s choice of clothing.
Naj Muddin Nasafi, who was born in Afghanistan and has lived and worked in the Chicago area for 20 years, finds special importance in Karzai’s choice of clothing for his worldwide travels. Elements of his look have been drawn from different areas of Afghanistan, Nasafi says, so “everyone would feel they have a part in the new start.”
The hat is made from the wool of qaraqul sheep from the Astrakhan region. “This was very much the fashion of the times during the 1970s and the late ’60s,” says Nasafi, an engineer who has participated in anthropological conferences at universities here. “This one [hat] is a flat one. It can get folded and get easily put it in the pocket.”
While the piran-tunban — the collarless tunic and loose pants — is common throughout the region, the robe’s (chapan) stylings draw its influence from the Uzbek cultures of northern Afghanistan.
“In the old times, it was [worn for] prestige,” says Nasafi. Today, he says, visiting dignitaries are often given one as an honor.
The next question is whether Karzai’s style will show up on the streets of New York, or perhaps Naperville.
“I think that it’s not inconceivable that there would be some kind of fashion influence from that part of the world,” says O’Brien. “One thing I liked about [Karzai] is his head gear. I think that could have an influence. Americans have been off of hats since John F. Kennedy. He kind of ended men’s hats. Here we have a president that wears hats and he looks good in them.”
Some, though, dismiss this fashion talk.
“He’s a very nice looking man. He’s well-groomed. He’s very neat. But I don’t see [that] as a great fashion statement,” says Jimmy Newcomer, a professor at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York. “I can’t imagine that anybody, in menswear or women’s wear, are going to be interested in that look right now.”
Nor does Bob Conner, the manager of Irv’s MensClothing on Orleans Street, expect his clientele to be interested in donning such clothes.
“We’ve had the shirt look [Karzai] was wearing this morning on television, which was the banded collar. That was here and gone,” Conner says. “I don’t see it coming back in the near future.”
