What do the embroideries worn by Claudia Sheinbaum, the first elected president of Mexico, mean?

Fireworks, shouts of joy and applause, on the night of Sunday, June 2, the atmosphere in Mexico’s Constitution Square was crazy. That evening, left-wing candidate Claudia Scheinbaum became the first woman to win the presidential election. In the process, he, who is also the former mayor of Mexico City, comes to greet the crowd. He is then dressed in a purple dress, characterized by a flower-embroidered sash at the waist, along with a matching suit jacket adorned with the same embroidery on the front.

On his Instagram account, which has nearly one million subscribers, this element is evident. During her presidential campaign, Claudia Scheinbaum rarely took off these multicolored embroideries. He wore a black and white patterned suit jacket to the polls on June 2. On the occasion of the closing of her election campaign, she adopted a short-sleeved purple dress, again decorated with a flower-embroidered ribbon at the waist. Even as she speaks in a more casual video posted to her Instagram account a week before her election, she wears a white tulle top…embroidered with sparkling flowers.

Mexican textile art

This style of clothing, which Claudia Scheinbaum has developed for a long time, is primarily a sign of Mexican craftsmanship. The Mexican president also “has an area where he keeps indigenous clothes and handicrafts that he received as gifts after traveling through the country’s 32 states,” according to the article. Western France . In October 2023, then in the election campaign, he even went to the state of Guerrero to welcome the work of textile artisans. And he is not the only one who is interested in this outfit. His right-wing rival, Xochitl Gálvez, of indigenous origin, wore a huipil, a traditional tunic from Central America and Mexico known for its brightly colored embroidery, to every match. which differ from village to village.

A way to reconnect with tradition, to highlight indigenous heritage through clothing, as Frida Kahlo did in the past. When others see it as an “election game,” like Andres Vidal, a doctor of social anthropology at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM). A few months ago, an expert told AFP that the outfits worn by the two women were part of a political strategy to simply “get closer to the electorate”. Whatever one thinks, it is impossible to deny the overwhelming victory of the 61-year-old Mexican, who was elected with almost 60% of the votes out of a total of 99 million registered voters.