Michelle Obama's Untraditional Outfit While Meeting Queen Elizabeth Will Always Haunt Her

The president and first lady must walk a fine line when it comes to wardrobe. When Barack Obama was elected in 2008, many wondered if he would follow the dress code of past presidents or if he would establish a fashion sense all his own, but it was his wife, Michelle Obama, whose wardrobe choices were truly put under a microscope.

A few months after moving into the White House in 2009, the Obamas traveled to London to meet Queen Elizabeth II. President Barack Obama wore a formal suit with a striped, dark-blue tie. The queen wore a vibrant pink dress with a flower brooch and a string of pearls. While Michelle also wore a pearl necklace, that's where the ladies' outfit similarities ended. Michelle decided to go with a black-and-white color scheme to match her husband's noir suit. She paired a white blouse with a black skirt and wore dark stockings and black heels with a subtle pointed toe. She completed the outfit with a questionable choice: draping a plain black cardigan sweater atop her shoulders.

Michelle's outfit came off as too casual and felt lifeless next to the queen's colorful ensemble. The first lady likely didn't want to pull focus from the meeting of the world leaders, but still, this look veered simple and boring. Luckily, Michelle Obama would go on to have a stunning style transformation in the following years where she would experiment with different colors and outfits that embraced her femininity while maintaining her professional demeanor. Though she didn't abandon her relaxed aesthetic completely, she did mix in much more formal ensembles. 

As first lady, Michelle Obama had a versatile sense of style that made her look gorgeous while dressed up and down, and she certainly came a long way from her Buckingham Palace 'fit. In 2016, she wore a dressier purple frock embellished with lace detail to a private lunch with Her Majesty and Windsor Castle, looking much more formal for the engagement. While attending a dinner with the queen in 2011, the former FLOTUS also wore a stunning boat-neck black gown, exuding royalty.

But not everyone embraced Michelle Obama's changing wardrobe, whether she was visiting the British monarch or not. In 2009, Michelle posed for her first White House portrait in a sleeveless black dress. Critics tried to paint the portrait as a fashion fail due to her exposed shoulders. The portrait was released in the winter, and some even said that the dress choice was out of season. Luckily, her stunningly classic black A-line gown hugged her curves and was brought to life with a tasteful pearl necklace, which is a modern way to pull trendy pearls into your wardrobe.

Michelle's occasional preference for more casual clothes, as we saw in her 2009 royal visit, has also helped her to appear relatable. In 2013, she appeared on "Late Night with Jimmy Fallon" for a comedy sketch called "Evolution of Mom Dancing," where she wore a teal shirt decorated with a small grid pattern, a green cardigan with a large checkered design, slacks, and ballet flats. (Fallon matched her look with a cardigan and slacks of his own!) The eclectic use of color allowed Mrs. Obama to come across as less formal than previous first ladies, much to the audience's delight. And whether formal or not, her style has no doubt influenced her daughters' fashion choices, including Sasha Obama's take on this once-outdated shoe trend that gives us serious outfit envy.