When Rama Duwaji stepped into 2026 as New York’s newest first lady, she did so in borrowed clothes.
Duwaji’s inauguration-day wardrobe delivered a message that was easy to miss and hard to dismiss: fashion doesn’t have to be owned to be powerful. It can be rented, loaned, thrifted, reworked, shared. She stood next to her husband Zohran Mandani at an abandoned subway in the NYC for an intimate mayoral inauguration ceremony in an outfit that unapologetically resonated with her personal style. Rama Duwaji’s vintage Balenciaga funnel-neck coat, worn to Zohran Mamdani’s midnight inauguration,
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