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Wisdom Kaye Doesn’t Know How Much He Spends on Clothes
POLO RALPH LAURENSport Coat, at ralphlauren.com.CALVIN KLEINTank Top, atcalvinklein.us.DIORSkirt,atdior.com.BVLGARIBracelet, atbvlgari.com.DSQUARED2Earrings,VALENTINOBrooch, GOOSSENS PARISCuffs, and GUCCIBoots, subject’s own.Photo: Iké Udé for New York Magazine
Wisdom Kaye plays dress-up for a living. He has a collection of thousands of pieces of designer clothing and accessories, which he wears, often elaborately layered, in highly produced videos he posts several times a week on TikTok, where he has nearly 15 million followers
Kaye posted his first video six years ago, when he was studying mechanical engineering at Texas State University. It was a compilation of outfits he purchased on a student budget: With a kind of nerdy swagger, Kaye flexes in high-waisted polyester flares, hipsterish round glasses, blousy dress shirts, and a conspicuous Hermès belt. “All the clothing I had, if it wasn’t from thrifting, it was from raiding my mom’s closet or, like, asking kids on campus if they had clothes they didn’t want,” he says. He kept posting, and his fans kept coming. Now, they often give him challenges to execute on-camera.
For one of his most popular posts, he created looks representing each planet in the solar system, complete with intricate metal headpieces commissioned from an artist in Ohio. During the World Cup, he stayed up until six in the morning filming the first of five videos in which he dresses up as every team in the tournament. That involved a lot of runway-grade Rick Owens and Maison Margiela and a flowing Issey Miyake robe he turned into an homage to the women of Cabo Verde.
“Some people think I’m always trying to flex, but I look at it like any other medium. If I were a painter or a musician, I’d take time to make a thing to show. It’s me making a body of work,” Kaye says
It’s early one morning in a photo studio on the West Side Highway, and Kaye, who doesn’t live too far away, is standing over a large tray festooned with jewelry, examining the spread like an archaeologist who has just discovered ancient treasure. He strokes his chin, then loads up his wrists with a stack of gold cuffs to finish his outfit
After pulling on a dramatic Dior wrap skirt, he roots through a bag for a pair of Gucci patent-leather heeled boots. “I’ve been wearing a lot of patent shoes, boots, loafers. Since this skirt has a bit of a sheen, I think it’ll complement the whole vibe,” he says. Most high-end labels are not designing for athletic, six-foot-four guys, but Kaye has learned to dress for his body over hundreds of social-media posts.
“For a long time, whenever I bought a new piece, I’d spend a bunch of hours, if not the whole day, making as many looks as I possibly could with that one item. It could be a tank top, it could be a jacket. Doing that gave me an understanding of how to really style stuff on me specifically,” he says. “It’s a mental game of adding things that suit the look and also feel like me.”
BRUNELLO CUCINELLISuit and Shirt, atshop.brunellocucinelli.com.CARTIERWatch, at Cartier boutiques nationwide.CHRISTIAN LOUBOUTINShoes, at christianlouboutin.com.DSQUARED2Earrings, TOM FORDNecklace, and JACQUES MARIE MAGESunglasses, subject’s own.Photo: Iké Udé for New York Magazine
Growing up in Texas, Wisdom dressed to fit in with his classmates, hitting Hollister and Abercrombie & Fitch at the local mall. He was interested in clothes but felt he couldn’t dress the way he wanted at his large suburban high school. Even cuffing his jeans could invite ridicule: “It didn’t take much for people to start whispering, you know?” Then he got to college and stumbled into a thrift store. “I honestly had never seen a pair of leather pants in person in my life, like, ever. That was huge,” Kaye says. He posted his secondhand finds on Instagram. At some point, someone from Dr. Martens offered him $300 to post a look in a pair of boots. “For $300, as a college student, I was like, Whoa, this is fucking amazing. I didn’t think that would ever happen,” he says.
Kaye was home from school for spring break when the campus shut down because of the pandemic, and he never went back. He had gotten on TikTok earlier that year, and the 20-second montages he posted modeling his clothes started going viral. Amateur men’s-fashion content, mostly posted by young straight guys like Kaye who know their way around a cape, was growing on the platform, and he was an early and inventive adopter. A video from that April in which he matched the lyrics of Megan Thee Stallion’s “Savage” with his version of “classy,” “bougie,” and “ratchet” outfits got 1 million likes.
That summer, he signed with the modeling agency IMG and shot a holiday campaign with fellow TikTok star Addison Rae. “I literally was like, This cannot be real. I was just a kid from Texas making videos in the corner of my room,” he says. “The negotiation of that deal, which was an astronomical number for me at the time, was the moment that made me go, This isn’t just a hobby I do every now and then when I have time away from class.”
FERRARI STYLESuit, similar styles at ferrari.com. BVLGARIBracelets and Ring. CHRISTIAN LOUBOUTINShoes. Brooch, DSQUARED2Earring, HOORSENBUHSSunglasses, and AUDEMARS PIGUETWatch, subject’s own.Photo: Iké Udé for New York Magazine
CALVIN KLEIN COLLECTIONVests. SYSTEMShorts, DSQUARED2Earring, VALENTINOBrooch, andSAINT LAURENT BY ANTHONY VACCARELLOBoots, subject’s own.Photo: Iké Udé for New York Magazine
These days, Kaye is one of the most bankable social-media stars in the fashion space; in addition to his TikTok numbers, he has 9 million followers on Instagram. Luxury labels such as Valentino employ his services, as do mass-market brands including Crocs, eBay, and Old Navy. He has attended the Met Gala twice and was invited to make a cameo in TheDevil Wears Prada 2. (He says he hasn’t seen the original.)
In a video posted last year, Kaye said he earned around $4.5 million in 2024, but he gets shy when I ask how much he’s made more recently. He will allow that his mom, who once hoped he’d go back to engineering school, no longer brings up the subject. He laughs when the conversation turns to his spending on clothes. “Too much,” he says. “It’s kind of my whole life.”
In the studio, Kaye is trying out different pieces, some from his own wardrobe, others brought in by a stylist. He pulls out another pair of patent-leather boots, knee-highs from Saint Laurent, that he recently bought. It’s clear they won’t zip up over his soccer-player calves. If you or I spent a few thousand dollars on a pair of shoes that didn’t fit, we would probably return them. Kaye instead grabs a roll of black tape. “I don’t really wear these out,” he says, as he wraps them shut. “I can make it work for the photo.”
It’s around one in the afternoon when the shoot wraps and Kaye changes into his street clothes — a black tank top, beaded Dries Van Noten trousers, and patent-leather loafers — to go back to his apartment to film the next edition of his World Cup series. (His three bedrooms are all closets, and he sleeps in an alcove.) “One thing I haven’t been able to get into is velvet shoes,” he tells me, sounding contrite, as if it’s a personal failing. Though he has more knee-high boots, Chrome Hearts, and Birkins than he knows what to do with, he wishes he could fit into even more womenswear. “If I were four or five inches shorter and a little skinnier, I would spend even more money on clothes because I could buy more from the women’s side,” he says. “It’s just more fun than a lot of men’s clothes.”
PAUL SMITHVest and Hat, atpaulsmith.com.PHIXShirt and SWAROVSKIEarring, subject’s own.Photo: Iké Udé for New York Magazine
FERRAGAMOBlazer, at ferragamo.com.CARTIERWatch, at Cartier boutiques nationwide.DSQUARED2Earrings and SCHIAPARELLIBrooch, subject’s own.Photo: Iké Udé for New York Magazine
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Wisdom Kaye Doesn’t Know How Much He Spends on Clothes
