Taylor Swift's career has been spent building worlds through music and wardrobe. As she sings at the beginning of her latest album, The Tortured Poets Department, every album has a "new aesthetic." Assisted by longtime stylist Joseph Cassell, Swift expresses the project's sound through a dress code of her own design (including Easter eggs that fans can decipher). country chart-topping songs on Fearless include fringed dress and cowboy boots, while the pop crossover moment of "1989" featured a crop top and sky-high heels.

Last week, Swift emerged from cosplaying her past self on the Eras tour to unveil the next chapter of her discography. Many were waiting to see what the artistic statement Swift, one of the world's biggest stars, was going to make in her haste, even before she arrived. (Swift's previous album, Midnights, defined by a hazy '70s aesthetic, had just debuted in October 2022.) Almost a week after its release, the goal of her Tortured Poets seemed to be to be more vulnerable than ever.

Tortured Poets' aesthetic slid away from the glitz and glamour of its predecessor and into a moody world filled with glazed tones. Dressed in black and white, corseted mourning gowns, pleated preppy mini-skirts, and chunky oxford shoes, Swift recreates the garb and anguish of the Victorian literary figures who inspired the album's lyrics. The garter and sensuality that was "bejeweled" in Midnights' heyday is given a gothic twist in Poets. Now Swift is approaching the bookish, charming, morbid Wednesday Adams, both emotionally and Sartrean.

Swift began laying the groundwork for the 2023 street-style tortured poet's aesthetic even before fans knew the new songs were available; between stadium stops on the Eras tour (or cheering on NFL players), Swift spent the summer and fall at Electric Lady studio and wore a dark, academia-inspired wardrobe that began with a crisp white button-up by R13 and transitioned to reformed penny loafers and checkered mini-skirts by Miu Miu. Finally, bustier-style tops from Versace and House of CBE joined the mix. These items were likely a reference to the late designer Vivienne Westwood, who played an inseparable role in modernizing the corset. Although Swift does not wear Westwood that often, her corsets expressed a similar sensuality and openness not seen in Swift's earlier casual attire. It was a maturation of her life's mission to wear her heart (or in Poet's case, her inner turmoil) on her sleeve.

Swift's casual outfits were also composed of a black and white palette, from Ralph Lauren's sweet eyelet set and Dohen's bouncy modern poet blouse to Gabriela Hearst's dark, gorgeous tank and gothic Alaia dress. The color scheme seemed to reference the pages on which her story (and that of her literary heroes) was written. Her all-black outfit represented mourning, foreshadowing the songs that would scatter the ashes of their grieving relationship.

When Swift officially announced the project at the 2024 Grammy Awards this past February, she wore a twisted white Schiaparelli gown and elbow-length black gloves. The look was based on Swift's street-style color palette, and album listeners know that it was also the first look to visualize the scenes Swift describes in the lyrics of Tortured Poets. Depending on the song (there are 31 to choose from), the folded fabrics evoke scenes of her torment, such as tangled bed sheets in a bedroom or escape ropes in a mental hospital.

Swift's outfits have always formed the visual moodboard for the albums she promotes, but the music videos and album visuals take fashion to an even higher level of editing. For example, the video for the lead single "Fortnight," which condenses the tragic arc of Tortured Poets into a single song. Swift expresses her anguish over a love affair that goes wrong in modernized Victorian fashions, such as Untold's waxed denim jacket, which mimics mid-1800s mourning attire, and Elena Velez's skirt (which is also featured in Swift's distant cousin (It also seems to borrow from Emily Dickinson's closet).

The strong-shouldered jacket makes Swift's attendance at last year's "Poor Things" premiere seem, in hindsight, like an Easter egg. In doing so, she added Mary Shelley, the pre-Victorian author who inspired her 1992 novel Frankenstein, to the list of female writers who have inspired her, proving that she is one of pop's most dedicated literary figures.

As a musician, Swift's special skill is to describe her own highly idiosyncratic experiences so vividly that (almost) everyone can share and understand them. In the same way, her fashion in "Poets" feels more stripped-down, poignant, and liberating. While Swift's pen documents her melancholy, it is represented by the skin-baring outfits that ooze from her colors.

The most raw and unadulterated of Swift's portraits that fans have seen so far are the album photo shoots, which play with light and shadow, sepia shades dipped in tea, and selective slices of skin in the bedroom. In one image, a mesquite bustier and slip skirt reflect the intimacy of lingerie. In others, the delicate silk straps of tops and dresses from The Row, Caite, and Saint Laurent fall from her shoulders. Perhaps that was the inspiration for the most sensual and sexual lyric on Swift's album. (Play "Guilty As Sin." for more.)

Swift is no stranger to baring her emotions, but this portrait from Tortured Poets is the harshest spotlight she's ever experienced, shedding her snakeskin and It feels as if she is stepping into the harshest spotlight she has ever experienced. In response, she bares almost everything. The costumes on her album recall the freeze-frame of a doorway when you step into a room and find someone half-clothed.

Swift ultimately splits in two throughout the lyrics of Tortured Poets. In one song, she is a pop star in a Versace bodysuit touring in record time during her "glittering heyday." In another, she is a student of Sylvia Plath, detailing a love so all-consuming that it "ruins (her) life." To perform on the world stage, she wears a coordinated mix of couture wedding dresses, designer bodysuits, quiet, upscale staples, and free-people items that any fan can afford. This mix of brands is not exclusive to Swift's latest era, but it does seem to be growing. Swift has professed on every other album how caged and cluttered she is. Her clothes, which can be dark or light, Victorian or modern, reflect the contradictions within her.

Having effectively sucked most of the air out of the media for the past year and a half, it may seem disillusioning (and jarring) to watch participants in the latest billionaires' club style themselves as losers. But it is a vivid reminder that the way out of self-loathing and sadness is not by dressing. If you're Taylor Swift, at least you can turn your mind to 31 new songs and a moody wardrobe to match.