It’s been one year since the election of Pope Leo XIV—Robert Francis Prevost, the first American-born pope—as leader of the Roman Catholic Church. 12 months in, Pope Leo has kept up much of the Augustinian sensibilities that he held as Cardinal Bob Prevost, all while navigating geopolitical unrest and fraught dialogue with President Donald Trump. His stances on war, migration, and economic equality have grown stronger, and he has made historic international trips.

The pope—crowned one of Vogue’s best dressed last year—represents the Catholic Church’s sociopolitical ideals on a global stage, and over the last year, Leo XIV’s sartorial sensibilities have also served as a visual representation of his vision for a modern papacy.

Last week, the Vatican released Leone a Roma, a documentary that traces the Chicago-born pope’s early years in Rome in the ’80s to today. In a scene shot before the two-day conclave that appointed him leader, sneakerheads were quick to spot the obscure Nikes peeking out from his cream clerical vestments: a pair of Nike’s Franchise Low Plus. (The sneaker was first released in the ’70s, and was re-released in 2008 for a brief time.)

A month after his election, Pope Leo was photographed wearing a black Chicago White Sox logo cap during an outing at the Vatican. While becoming the pope comes with many sacrifices, relinquishing home team spirit does not seem to be one of them.

But let us remember that the shot of Leo and his Nike kicks comes from a Vatican-produced documentary—made by a state that basically originated the sartorial signifier, a body that articulated its strength, influence, and power through gilded imagery centuries before logomania. Pope Leo’s connection to the United States, as well as a sense of youth and contemporary pop culture, works well for how the Catholic Church seeks to position itself as a modern power.

Upon Pope Leo’s election, Vogue spoke with Filippo Sorcinelli, a master tailor and artist who has now outfitted three popes. (Lying in state in St. Peter’s Basilica before his funeral, Pope Francis wore a white silk and gold-trimmed miter created by Sorcinelli’s Atelier Lavs.) At the time, Sorcinelli—a tall, handsome, tattooed gay man who dresses in chic, all-black suits—did not know if he would be called upon again.

He began dressing Pope Benedict in 2007 and designed more than 50 ornate and detailed robes for him. Sorcinelli’s striking designs stand out in the contemporary world of liturgical garments for his focus on the medieval style, reinterpreted through modern materials and contemporary technology. This year he celebrates 25 years in the sacred garments space. “I feel with greater clarity the responsibility of a work that belongs to the church even before it belongs to my own personal story,” Sorcinelli shares with Vogue today. “The sacred vestment becomes the visible language of faith… it possesses an immense symbolic force. The person recedes, and the sign emerges.”

Sorcinelli recalls meeting Pope Leo—then cardinal Prevost—in the small commune of Tolentino in Marche, central Italy, many years before his election. “I remember his composure, the calmness of his gaze, an inner sobriety already fully legible,” he says.

Each of the three pontificates he has dressed, Sorcinelli says, have had their own distinct style identities. “Benedict XVI embodied the doctrinal splendour of form; Francis brought beauty back to its pastoral essentiality; and Leo XIV seems to gather order, contemplation, and the Roman sense of the church into a figure of austere clarity,” he explains.

Designs for Francis reflected his humble personality, with garments inspired by Italian Renaissance painter Giotto’s medieval fresco cycles—especially those in Assisi, in a nod to the saint’s name he chose. He chose only simple and necessary jewelry, and plain pants and robes.

Sorcinelli acknowledges the liturgical garment as an important image for the Catholic faith today, but as “one of duality.” “[It is] both archaic and future-facing, evoking the continuity of tradition, authority, sacrifice, order, and transcendence. In an age dominated by the rapid image, the pontifical vestment imposes duration,” he says. So while the papacy isn’t immune to a trend cycle, per se, it does last a few generations or so.

Pope Leo’s wardrobe, meanwhile, reflects a dialogue between tradition and modernity, in the same way his papal mission has. He has introduced more color, rich fabrics, texture, as well as traditional and historic details, to his papal wardrobe. This is more in line with what Benedict, John Paul II, and leaders of the Middle Ages wore, and therefore reflects a more traditional view after Francis’s more progressive tenure. When he appeared on the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica after being elected, Leo XIV wore a classic red satin mozzetta and gold-embroidered stole paired with a cross pendant on a gold silk cord. At his inaugural mass last May, he chose white papal trousers (whereas Francis kept to simple black), an opulent lacy amitto around the neck, and a braided belt known as a cingulum, as well as said cufflinks. (Which Francis avoided wearing.)

In his first mass to the cardinals on May 2025 at the conclusion of the conclave, Pope Leo wore a Sorcinelli-designed Celestinian chasuble (an ornate vest), making use of fabrics from a garment gifted by Cardinal Giuseppe Petrocchi to Francis in 2022, which had yet to be worn. In Monaco, for Lent in March 2026, Sorcinelli created an original set of vestments consisting of a chasuble and miter (pointed ceremonial headgear) for Pope Leo, and a suite of complementary garments for the celebrants and deacons. Materials represented Lent: 1,200 meters of purple wool to symbolize penitence and royalty, 35 meters of purple silk brocade woven with silver threads as “a reflection of the glory still hidden,” 50 meters of silver quilting, 100 faceted amethyst beads, and 150 bows.

Last November, Pope Leo led mass in Rome’s Church of Sant’Anselmo all’Aventino to celebrate the 125th anniversary of the dedication of the Benedictine temple. Sacred vestments—the chasuble, miter, and dalmatic—were made of pure silk with gold threads, with alternating motifs inspired by the decorations of the Basilica and the Benedictine Order.

“The Church has always understood that faith also passes through form,” says Sorcinelli. Pope Leo continues to position himself as a bridge-builder, and while history and heritage are imbued in his choice of traditional vestments, a very modern form of influence emerges in a swoosh. The devil may wear Prada, but the pope wears Nike.