Viktor Anisimov, one of Ukraine’s top fashion designers, first met Volodymyr Zelenskyy about 20 years ago, when the future president was a comedian. He didn’t want to wear a suit then either. Photo: The New York Times
Viktor Anisimov, one of Ukraine’s top fashion designers, first worked with the future president of Ukraine about 20 years ago. That was when Volodymyr Zelenskyy was part of a comedy troupe whose members all dressed in T-shirts and leather pants.
Anisimov coaxed them into trying classic suits.
So in January, when Zelenskyy’s wife wanted a new look for her husband, and her office reached out to Anisimov, he had a familiar thought. Suits.
It didn’t matter to him that Zelenskyy had repeatedly said he would not wear a suit until the war with Russia was over and that he had worn only military garb in solidarity with his troops.
Nor did it matter that the designer knew Zelenskyy did not care about clothing.
“He dressed for comfort,” Anisimov said in an interview in his workshop, surrounded by clothing racks.
But, he added, “They thought he might listen to me.”
Anisimov, 61, never expected to end up in the fashion world. He had planned to be a military man for the Soviet Union.
But these days, he not only has his own successful design business, but he is also the fashion consultant for Zelenskyy, fielding questions about what Ukraine’s leader planned to wear for his meeting with US president Donald Trump last week (Oct 17).
His answer: He just designs the clothes. The president picks what he wants to wear.
On Friday (Oct 17), Zelenskyy showed up at the White House in an outfit Anisimov had designed in the last few weeks.
Read more: Want to learn how to dress like Donald Trump? Then you need to watch this film
Anisimov was born in a small town about 120 miles northwest of Kyiv, when Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union.
He graduated from a military institute in what is now St Petersburg, Russia, and then joined the Soviet military.
After the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, he started a construction company in Donetsk, an industrial city in Ukraine’s east known for metallurgy and coal mining that would later become the heart of the war. It is now occupied by Russia.
One day, in the summer of 1997, an acquaintance who owned a beauty salon there asked him to work on a new project.
Knowing he was creative with metalwork and that he often sketched intricate designs, she wondered if he could make clothing hangers as a backdrop for a hairdressing contest.
He ended up designing elaborate metal hangers with black fabric that resembled dresses.
A woman hunting for talent for a new event, Ukrainian Fashion Week, spotted the hangers. She loved them.
She invited Anisimov to come to the first fashion week that year. He was skeptical, but she insisted. And so he designed his first collection, featuring black formfitting dresses held up by structured silver metal pieces resembling chunky avant-garde jewellery.
The line was a smash. He decided to forego construction for fashion.
“It’s very rare to find designers who, without a professional education, reach the level he has,” said Iryna Danylevska, who founded Ukrainian Fashion Week and first noticed Anisimov’s hangers.
“Everything he does is very complex. There’s a deep philosophy in each of his pieces.”
The offices of both Zelenskyy and his wife, Olena Zelenska, declined to comment for this article.
When Anisimov got the call in January about changing up Zelenskyy’s style, he planned to inch the president in a more suity direction, step by step.
But then came the disastrous February meeting in the White House, when Zelenskyy was criticized for his clothing.
Suddenly, Anisimov’s mission became tricky. If Zelenskyy abandoned his traditional military fashion after being dressed down in Washington, he would look as if he had caved to the suits in the US.
So Anisimov went slow. For the first step, he created a black jacket with straight hems, the corners cut at 90 degrees. It conjured a military vibe, close to Zelenskyy’s style.
A photo lineup of designs by Viktor Anisimov at a show in Kyiv on Sept 5, 2025. Photo: The New York Times
Zelenskyy wore it for his first meeting with Trump since the debacle, on the sidelines of the funeral of Pope Francis in the Vatican in late April.
Anisimov then moved to the second step. He made a new black blazer with rounded corners instead of straight ones. Zelenskyy wore it to the NATO summit in late June.
“People even placed bets on whether Zelenskyy would wear a suit or not, and when he would,” Anisimov recalled.
“Everyone was calling me: ‘You’re the designer, tell us, is this a suit?’”
He moved on to the third step: Operation Suitish.
He wanted to shake up Zelenskyy’s colour scheme. So he designed a military-style formal jacket and matching pants in dark blue.
He added a yellow boutonniere of wheat stalks so the suit had the colours of Ukraine’s flag.
Read more: 'Of steely, precise armour': Melania Trump's fashion once again under scrutiny
On a Friday in mid-August, Anisimov took the suit, and an identical one in black, to Zelenskyy. He hoped the president would pick one to wear for the country’s Independence Day in nine days.
Zelenskyy rejected the blue suit. “He said, ‘This looks too fashionable,’” Anisimov said.
But Zelenskyy took the black one.
The designer asked Zelenskyy to sign the blue jacket. “Glory to Ukraine,” Zelenskyy scrawled in black marker on the back, along with the date: Aug 15, 2025.
Zelenskyy again met Trump in the White House on Aug 18. He wore the black suit, pairing it with a black collared button-up shirt and no tie.
“I cannot believe it,” Trump said, giving Zelenskyy the once-over. “I love it. Look at you.”
Zelenskyy wore the same suit to the UN General Assembly last month.
On Friday (Oct 17) he wore a different suit, Anisimov said, though it looks similar to the one Zelenskyy wore in August and last month. When Trump greeted Zelenskyy on Friday, he complimented him on the outfit.
Anisimov said he has been pleased with how the Ukrainian president looks these days. But he has dreams of another step.
“A classic suit,” Anisimov said. “I hope that happens soon.” – ©2025 The New York Times Company
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
