President Donald Trump and his wife Melania Trump were among the dozens of world figures who attended Pope Francis’ funeral Saturday in St. Peter’s Square in Rome.

An estimated crowd of 250,000 people turned up for the event including such dignitaries as French president Emmanuel Macron, U.K. prime minister Keir Starmer, Ukrainian president Volodomyr Zelensky and Prince William among others. Although several of the heads of state wore black suits, POTUS chose a blue one. Fittingly, the tradition of wearing black as a sign of mourning traces back to the Roman Empire, when a dark or black yoga, which was known as a “toga pulla,” symbolized the absence of color, light and life, according to some academics. Wearing black mourning suits with tails, Saturday’s pall bearers escorted Pope Francis’ zinc-lined cypress coffin.

The body of the 266th pope was in a red chasuble and a damask and gold-colored papal mitre. His burial at the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore makes him the first pope to be buried outside of The Vatican, since Leo XII in 1903.

President Trump’s pre-funeral meeting with Zelensky inside of St. Peter’s Basilica, and a photograph of the two men huddled with Macron and Starmer have attracted global attention. While negotiations about ending the Russian invasion of Ukraine have been in fits and starts, a second meeting between Trump and Zelensky was scheduled for Saturday. The Ukrainian leader did not wear the military style attire that he has maintained throughout the war as a sign of solidarity to his country’s soldiers on Saturday. Instead, he turned up in a black buttoned collared jacket with black pants and black shoes.

The First Lady wore an all-black ensemble from the Italian designer label Dolce & Gabbana. The former model decided on a double breasted black coat in black lightweight wool that was paired with a black mantilla in silk georgette with a Chantilly lace border and black Chantilly lace gloves. The Italian designers Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana provided the accessories too. Trump’s predecessor Jill Biden also sported all black including a mantilla. Her husband Joe, who is among the world’s nearly one billion Catholics, arrived wearing a dark suit with his signature Ray Ban aviator sunglasses.

Pope Francis’ funeral coincides with Melania Trump’s 55^th birthday. Like many at Saturday’s service, FLOTUS appeared solemn. The Slovenian-born former model was raised in a country that is 74 percent Catholic.

Trump had also worn an all-black ensemble and black mantilla by Dolce & Gabbana, when she met the late pope with her husband in 2017. During that visit, His Holiness had joked with the First Lady about feeding the President potica, a Slovenian hand-rolled pastry, her former spokeswoman Stephanie Grisham confirmed at that time.

Trump has selected Dolce & Gabbana for several key occasions. She departed for Italy Friday from Joint Andrew Base in a Dolce & Gabbana dove gray double-breasted trench coat with a black Hermès Birkin bag and Roger Vivier flats. The two-time First Lady also chose a Dolce & Gabbana tailored black blazer with wide satin lapels over an unbuttoned white top for her official 2025 White House portrait that was photographed by Régine Mahaux. FLOTUS’ tuxedo-style suit was completed with a Ralph Lauren cummerbund. Trump also chose a Dolce & Gabbana ensemble for her 2017 official portrait.

Asked about Trump’s affinity for the Italian brand, Mahaux said Friday, “She’s always had a great relationship with Dolce & Gabbana. She is a very faithful person and has been wearing their outfits for a long time. It made sense to chose them given the place of religion in Italian culture.”

In 2016, after Gabbana, who co-founded the label with Dolce, thanked the First Lady for her support by describing her as a “DG Woman” on Instagram, he caught some heat for doing so.

Wherever and whenever first ladies make major appearances on the worldwide stage, there is plenty of scrutiny. And sometimes their absence can be equally analyzed. During a podcast interview with Taraji P. Henson earlier this week, Michelle Obama said she had to “basically trick” herself into skipping President Trump’s second inauguration.

“It started with not having anything to wear,” Obama said in the interview. “I was like, ‘If I’m not going to do this thing, I got to tell my team, I don’t even want to have a dress ready,’ right? Because it’s so easy to just say ‘let me do the right thing.’”

Netflix watchers will glean more insights about Melania Trump’s fashion sense, when the multimillion dollar documentary about her life is said to have a fall release.