Dressed for succession: What Kim Ju Ae's outfits tell us about North Korea

In November 2022, a photo emerged of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un with a smartly-dressed young girl by his side - his daughter Ju Ae.

Strolling alongside her father in front of a towering intercontinental ballistic missile, she wore black trousers and a white padded jacket with her long hair tied back.

Making her debut in state propaganda - she was reportedly just nine years old at the time - Ju Ae was already dressed to impress.

Since then her hairstyles have become more elaborate, her attire increasingly elegant and sophisticated.

South Korea's spy agency believes that Kim Jong Un has chosen her as his successor, given her rising prominence at such a young age.

Ju Ae, believed to now be 13, has been increasingly photographed with her father, standing next to him at missile launches and military parades and even accompanying him on overseas trips.

But some analysts believe that her fashion - leathers, furs, and a "rooster" hairstyle - are also signs that she is being groomed to lead the country.

Ju Ae's outfits are likely to be dictated by the government's Propaganda and Agitation Department.

At times, she has been seen dressed in formal suits and skirts, resembling her mother Ri Sol Ju.

"As Ju Ae is still very young, her age could be seen as a potential weakness for a future leader. It appears the regime is dressing her in formal outfits similar to those worn by her mother as a way to mask her youth and project a more mature image," Sejong Institute deputy director Cheong Seong-chang tells BBC Korean.

At other times, she has worn leather jackets, "clothing that is both strong in impression and casual" which would be suitable for visiting "relatively rough or rugged locations" such as military bases, noted Cheong.

But it also has meant that she ends up twinning with her father, who is fond of wearing black leather jackets and trench coats.

Mirroring the fashions of previous generations, known as "image replication", is a tactic that North Korean leaders have employed to retain power.

During the early years of his leadership, Kim Jong Un sought to secure his legitimacy by dressing like his grandfather Kim Il Sung.

Kim Il Sung, who founded and led North Korea for more than 45 years, is effectively seen as a deity in the country, according to experts.

"The Propaganda and Agitation Department played a significantly important role in orchestrating a series of processes that naturally transferred respect for Kim Il Sung to Kim Jong Un," Cheong says.

"It is said that North Korean residents were surprised when Kim Jong Un first appeared. But the reason South Korean experts were also surprised is that the first glimpse of Kim Jong Un looked so much like the young Kim Il Sung.

"The limitations young Kim Jong Un faced as a successor, such as his lack of experience and age, could be offset solely by the fact that he resembled Kim Il Sung.

"It got to the point that rumours circulated among North Koreans that Kim Il Sung had been reincarnated."

Beyond cementing Ju Ae's legitimacy, "by wearing Western-designed clothing, Ju Ae and Ri Sol Ju are demonstrating a 'differentiation strategy' - that their social standing is fundamentally different from that of ordinary residents", noted Cheong.

The fact that Ju Ae has been seen wearing leather jackets on several occasions indicates that the Propaganda and Agitation Department is keen on setting her status above normal citizens.

"Wearing clothing made of high-quality leather is a way of showing off one's special status," says Cheong.

"Leather clothing is not that common among North Korean residents. Luxury brands, leather jackets and fur coats are precious clothes that can't be worn by ordinary North Koreans."

Ju Ae's evolving fashion stands in stark contrast to the tightening controls on the rest of the population.

In 2020, North Korea enacted the Reactionary Ideology and Culture Rejection Act, blocking "external culture".

But in 2023, the state-run Korean Central News Agency released a video of Ju Ae again strolling alongside her father in front of an intercontinental ballistic missile, this time wearing a black padded jacket later identified as a $1,900 (£1,405) purchase from luxury French fashion house Christian Dior.

The following year, Ju Ae wore a partially see-through blouse - revealing her arms - to the completion ceremony for a residential area of the capital, Pyongyang.

A video lecture was then released as a directive to ordinary citizens, warning that such hairstyles and outfits could not be worn by them as they were "anti-socialist and non-socialist phenomena that blur the image of the socialist system and eat away at the regime - targets that must be eradicated", a local source told Radio Free Asia.

These incidents have highlighted how the Kim family - who are treated almost as god-like figures - are often exempt from rules that apply to the rest of society.

"Although jeans are banned in North Korea as a Western fashion item, Kim Jong Un has appeared wearing them," Prof Lee Woo-young, of the University of North Korean Studies, says.

"No matter how much they ban foreign culture and even enact laws, North Korea is a place where there is nothing the supreme leader is unable to do."

Still, that has not stopped some North Koreans from wanting to keep up with the Kims and dress as sophisticatedly as Ju Ae.

There have been reports of an uptick in luxury goods such as Chanel cosmetics and perfumes circulating among wealthy North Koreans, while fur coats have become popular in a city bordering China.

Photographs of children at a prestigious kindergarten wearing partially see-through blouses have surfaced. There are also reports of sunglasses and leather trenchcoats similar to those worn by Ju Ae and Kim Jong Un becoming popular among affluent young people.

This is not unusual in North Korea - there have been reports in the past of young men sporting Kim Jong Un's hairstyle.

Ordinary North Koreans have very restricted access to information from the outside world including fashion trends, making the country's leader an unlikely fashion icon.

Now, his daughter appears to have become one too.

Additional reporting by Hyunjung Kim.