Jagger Zaas, brunette in black corset

I’ll start with a confession. Lingerie on guys was something I’d always found slightly off the mark. Too forced, too “concept,” too fashion week for us regular folks. Then I stumbled across Shaun’s Corset series featuring Jagger Zaas, and I shut my mouth in thirty seconds flat.

Jagger, for those just tuning in, is a curly-haired brunette with golden skin, long falling locks, sharp jawline, dark gaze, and a spine tattooed with vertical script running down to the small of his back. Lean, natural, not an ounce of gym bulk. The kind of guy you’d picture in an artist’s studio in Mexico rather than a cross-fit competition. And that’s precisely why the black corset sits on him like it’s meant to be there.

The shot that got me is in black and white. Jagger is stretched out on a dark velvet chair, back arched, arm folded over his face, like he just fell asleep from exhaustion. The corset cinches his waist, the boning traces the arc of his ribs, the garter belt cuts diagonally across his thigh. And the lighting does the rest: it doesn’t just show, it caresses. The curve of his flank, the jutting shoulder blades, the dimple at the base of his spine, just before the velvet takes over.

Shaun, the photographer, gets something simple: a guy in lingerie works when you stop playing the costume card. Here, we’re not dealing with a vintage pin-up parody. We’re looking at a portrait of a guy who just happened to end up in lingerie on a Sunday afternoon, closed his eyes, and let himself be seen. The lace doesn’t make the moment, it accompanies it. And that’s the difference between eroticism and carnival costume.

Special shoutout to the tousled brown curls falling over his nape, and the beard trimmed just right so we don’t forget we’re looking at a man. Because that’s the other tour de force of this series: Jagger doesn’t give up anything of his masculinity wearing this corset. He’s not cross-dressing, he’s just dressing differently. And between you and me, it makes you want to undo those laces one by one, slowly, without skipping a single one.

I don’t know about you, but this series reminded me of my last trip to Berlin, in a mixed bar where a guy in a leather skirt was sipping his spritz like it was nothing. Nobody looked shocked, nobody looked like they’d won the culture war either. Just a guy, a skirt, a drink. Jagger Zaas is the studio version of that guy, more tattooed, more brunette, and more tightly laced into his corset.