Melania Trump Is Well Suited in Official Portrait
Reaction to the first lady’s striking imagery is in the eye of the beholder.
First Lady Melania Trump released her official White House portrait this week and the consensus is: She means business.
Many taking in the image remarked how it broke from tradition. The photo, taken by Belgian photographer Régine Mahaux, was shot in black and white.
Many were drawn immediately to the first lady’s attire. Mrs. Trump, a former model, wore a dark blazer, unbuttoned, with wide satin lapels designed by Dolce & Gabbana that was paired with a white button-down shirt and Ralph Lauren cummerbund and pants. Mahaux photographed Mrs. Trump for her 2017 White House portrait, where she also wore Dolce & Gabbana.


Also noted in the image was Mrs. Trump’s stance. She is leaning to one side with the fingertips of both hands firmly planted on the edge of a reflective tabletop in the Yellow Room of the White House. Her stare into the camera, by comparison to her 2017 portrait, is more serious. The photographer reportedly said the image captures the first lady’s “kindness.” And over her shoulder out the window is the towering Washington Monument. What is not dominantly displayed in the 2025 portrait is the large diamond ring on her left hand that is visible in the 2017 portrait.
Those are the physical details. But that’s not what struck Michelle Gullion, senior director of curatorial services at the National First Ladies Library & Museum at the First Ladies National Historic Site in Canton, Ohio. When she saw the image for the first time, she saw something abstract: confidence.
“Her straight-ahead gaze in a business pantsuit with the symbolism of the Washington Monument behind her exudes a confident, powerful woman in Washington,” Gullion told East Wing Magazine.
“Her straight-ahead gaze in a business pantsuit with the symbolism of the Washington Monument behind her exudes a confident, powerful woman in Washington,” Gullion told East Wing Magazine.
Mrs. Trump’s portrait, said Gullion, also conjured up images of former first ladies, like the painting of former First Lady Hillary Clinton in a pantsuit. Former First Lady Betty Ford dancing on the Cabinet Room table, although not an official portrait. And, it reminded her of Michelle Obama’s official portrait “where she rocks wearing a sleeveless dress and showing off her amazingly toned arms.”

“I like photos of women who look confident in themselves,” Gullion said.
In the four years since the Trumps last occupied the White House, Mrs. Trump has, indeed, tended to her personal business interests. She launched a website bearing her name that sells her memoir, Melania (released last year), Christmas ornaments, jewelry and digital collectible photographs taken by Mahaux. She announced earlier this month that she struck a deal with Amazon Prime Video for the making of a documentary about her life of which she is an executive producer and that will be released later this year. And on the eve of her husband’s inauguration, Mrs. Trump launched a cryptocurrency. “Melania’s Meme” coin comes from her own incorporated company MKT World LLC, a firm she has used for various ventures, BBC News reported.
For others though, if Mrs. Trump meant business in the imagery of her second White House portrait, it came off as costumery, according to some critics.
“It resembles nothing so much as a promo image for the next season of a show, if it existed, might be called ‘The Boardroom,’” The New York Times critiqued, adding “If there was a tagline to accompany the photo, it might read, ‘It’s my turn now.’ The energy is less first lady than boss lady.”
For Vogue, the show the portrait conjured was the 15-season reality series of her husband’s creation.
“Indeed, Trump looked more like she was guest starring on an episode of The Apprentice than assuming the role of first lady of the United States,” according to the fashion magazine.
Vogue went on with a searing description of the first lady looking “more like a freelance magician than a public servant.”
Women’s Wear Daily described Mrs. Trump’s photo as “an iconoclast moment for first lady White House portraits, and it’s an image that has parallels to her husband Donald’s own 2025 White House portrait—his done with a scowl and furrowed brows that bare an uncanny resemblance to the World War I-era Uncle Sam military recruitment posters.”
In the past, portraits of all the living former first ladies—Dr. Jill Biden, Michelle Obama, Laura Bush, Hillary Clinton—were all smiling. There were flowers in the frame. And, some traditionally wore pearl necklaces.

What stood out for Gullion was not the fashion Mrs. Trump chose, but how the image evoked the work of other fashion photographers known for their monochrome imagery—Richard Avedon, Heb Ritts and Helmet Newton. Mrs. Trump’s official portrait is displayed on the White House website and will eventually be housed at the National Archives Records and Administration.
“It is a nice touch and homage to Mrs. Trump’s modeling career,” Gullion said. “The light catches the reflection from the table and softens the windows and background to frame the first lady beautifully.”
The Weekly Wrap
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