Of the many cultural flashpoints in Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl half-time performance on Sunday, one that few observers saw coming was his decision to wear two outfits by the Spanish high street brand Zara.
As the most-watched event on US television, the Super Bowl half-time show is a marketing moment as much as a musical one. From Rihanna’s pregnancy reveal to Kendrick Lamar’s show-stealing jeans, the 13-minute showcase has long doubled as a luxury fashion parade.
And few musicians are as plugged into that world as the Puerto Rican megastar. Bad Bunny has fronted underwear campaigns for Calvin Klein and Jacquemus, and on 1 February he attended the Grammys in a black velvet Schiaparelli suit sculpted into an hourglass with gold corsetry laced down the back.
As Spotify’s most-streamed artist of 2025, Bad Bunny is about as famous as a musician can be. But he is also one of the most visually astute performers. Just as this all-Spanish lyrics underlined the fact that English is no longer pop music’s lingua franca, his decision to wear high street at television’s most-watched event suggests couture is no longer pop’s default uniform either.
With its affordable interpretations of catwalk trends, Zara remains the emblem of budget-friendly – albeit unsustainable – chic, sitting at the centre of the runway-to-high street pipeline. Almost anyone can wear Zara.
Bad Bunny’s first look comprised a collared shirt and tie, cropped off-white trousers, Adidas Resilience trainers and a cropped padded American football jersey with the word Ocasio – part of his full name, Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio – across the back.
Worn at the start of his performance within a sugar cane field surrounded by dancers in the straw hats worn by jíbaros, Puerto Rico’s rural farmers (Benito also wore a jíbaro-style rope belt), the outfit initially sparked speculation about the number 64 emblazoned across the front. Online sleuths variously suggested it referred to the year of his mother’s birth and the US Congress that granted Puerto Ricans citizenship in 1917. According to Complex magazine, it was in fact his uncle’s football jersey number.
It was not until he re-emerged midway through his 13-minute set for a duet with Lady Gaga, wearing a broad-shouldered off-white suit and tie, that Zara confirmed it was behind both looks. Styled by Storm Pablo and Marvin Douglas Linares, the outfits were bespoke; off the rack, a Zara suit would cost about £250.
Andrew Groves, a professor of fashion design at the University of Westminster in London, UK, said: “The suit still reads as authority, but the authority comes from Bad Bunny’s cultural position, not from a luxury house’s stamp of approval.
“Though Bad Bunny isn’t wearing a zoot suit [the wide style worn by young Black and Latino people in the 30s and 40s that became a symbol of rebellion against marginalisation] it uses the same proportional logic: exaggerated volume as a way for Black and Latino communities to claim public space when visibility was policed.
“On a stadium stage it reads as controlled presence, not decoration. Zara on a Super Bowl stage is a statement about power-shifting.”
The suit’s fluid cut even drew comparisons to Francisco Goya’s anti-war masterpiece the Third of May 1808, which depicts a Spanish civilian wearing a billowing white shirt facing a French firing squad.
Other cultural references were more overt. Lady Gaga wore a custom blue pleated ruffle dress with a flor de maga (Puerto Rico’s national flower) brooch by Luar, the New York label led by the Dominican designer Raul Lopez, echoing the colours of the Puerto Rican flag. Within the set design’s pink casita, inspired by the island’s candy-coloured homes, dancers wore knitted outfits by the Puerto Rican designer Jomary Segarra’s brand Yo+.
Super Bowl half-time shows have long been style spectacles, but they occasionally veer into politics. Beyoncé’s 2016 Formation performance, with its Black Panther references, made global headlines.
After saying “ICE out” at the Grammys last week, there had been speculation that Bad Bunny could make another political statement. He did not wear an Ice Out pin. Instead, he wore something his fans could afford – paying homage to a pop culture that is increasingly multilingual, international and, at its heart, accessible.
