“I Can’t Give Clothes a Gender”

Bad Bunny doesn’t follow trends, he sets them. The Puerto Rico native opened up about his sense of style for a new interview with GQ. Bad Bunny, whose real name is Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, is a pioneer among the Latinx community, not only for his music, but also for his fashion. In a culture that is still predominately associated with machismo a.k.a. masculine pride, the artist is breaking barriers, noting that clothes is genderless.

“It depends on my state of mind,” he told the publication about his ever-shifting style. “Everybody has to feel comfortable with what they are, and how they feel. Like, what defines a man, what defines being masculine, what defines being feminine? I really can’t give clothes gender. To me, a dress is a dress. If I wear a dress, would it stop being a woman’s dress? Or vice versa? Like, no. It’s a dress, and that’s it. It’s not a man’s, it’s not a woman’s. It’s a dress.”

One recent example of Bad Bunny’s androgynous style was his 2022 Met Gala look. He wore a classic blue collared shirt and black tie, a tan puff-sleeve jacket and skirt as a way to honor both women’s and men’s fashion in Puerto Rico during the Gilded era.

He added, “Latino culture is very machista. So, that’s why I think everything that I’ve done has been even more shocking .… Urban Latin music, reggaeton, is a genre where you have to be the manliest, the baddest. That’s why it’s the most shocking too.”

Bad Bunny also commented on the stereotype that comes with being a reggaeton artist. “But why? If I dress this way, I can’t sing this way? Or if I dress like this, I can’t listen to this type of music?”

Check out Bad Bunny’s GQ cover below.